So 


RELIGION  AND  THE  GROWING  MIND 


RELIGION    AND    THE 
GROWING  MIND 


BY 


JOHN  DOUGLAS  ADAM,  D.D. 


New  York  Chicago  Toronto 

Fleming  H.  Revell  Company 

London     and     Edinburgh 


Copyright,   191 2,  by 
FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


New  York:  158  Fifth  Avenue 
Chicago:  125  North  Wabash  Ave. 
Toronto:  25  Richmond  Street,  W. 
London :  2 1  Paternoster  Square 
Edinburgh:      100    Princes    Street 


PREFACE 


NO  attempt  is  here  made  to  even  suggest 
an  outline  of  the  full  range  of  Chris- 
tian belief.  The  aim  is  simply  to 
endeavor  to  interpret  a  way  of  approach  to 
Christian  reality  for  the  growing  mind.  If 
some  earnest,  and  perplexed,  minds  are  helped 
in  finding  a  point  of  contact  with  the  primary 
facts  which  produce  Christian  experience  the 
end  in  view  will  have  been  achieved. 

J.  D.  A. 


CONTENTS 


I.     What  Are  We? ' 9 

II.     Why  Are  We  Here? 18 

III.  Our  Sense  of  Need 28 

IV.  God's  'Answer  to  Our  Sense  of 

Need 36 

V.     How  Do  We  Enter  into  the 

Knowledge  of  Christ  ? . . . .      48 

VI.    What  Is  the  Bond  That  Binds 

Us  to  Christ  ? 56 

VII.     How     Does     Faith     Express 

Itself  towards  God  ? 65 

VIII.    What  Does  Christ  Do  for  Our 

Lives? 73 

IX.    Obedience    to    the    Will    of 

Christ 83 

X.    The   Dangerous   Whisper   in 

THE  Soul 91 

XL     The  Divine  Whisper  in  the 

Soul 99 

7 


8  Contents 

XII.    What      Is      Our      Attitude 

Towards  Life? io8 

XIII.  Service  from  Centre  to  Cir- 

cumference  I 

XIV.  Places  of  Emphasis  in  Service.    125 

XV.     The    Growing    Mind    under 

Cross  Examination 135 


WHAT  ARE  WE? 

ARE  we  bodies  incidentally  possessing 
souls,  or  are  we  souls  having  bodies? 
Which  shall  be  supreme?  Shall  the 
physical  house  imprison  the  man,  or  shall  the 
man  possess  the  house  ?  Shall  the  mind  make 
soul  or  body  its  favorite?  Shall  the  demands, 
the  instincts,  of  the  higher  or  lower  nature 
have  supreme  consideration?  Shall  the  soil 
smother  the  seed,  or  shall  the  seed  gather 
strength  from  the  soil  and  rise  into  blossom 
above  it? 

The  problem  is  to  place  the  emphasis  where 
it  belongs,  and  then  to  give  soul  and  body  their 
legitimate  opportunity.  For  they  are  bound  up 
together,  they  act  and  react  upon  each  other. 
The  body  is  not  the  enemy  of  the  soul,  and  the 
soul  is  not  the  enemy  of  the  body,  so  long  as 
the  rights  of  each  are  recognised.  But  that  is 
the  task,  to  give  each  its  place.  If  we  submit 
our  thoughts  to  the  cravings  and  sensations  of 
the  body,  while  we  ignore  the  promptings  of 

9 


10     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

the  soul,  we  go  backwards,  we  become  untrue 
to  our  destiny  as  human  beings.  That  means 
we  have,  for  the  time,  given  up  the  real  battle 
of  life,  we  have  hung  out  the  white  flag  of 
surrender. 

But  if  we  steadily  insist  that  the  instincts 
of  the  higher  life  shall  dominate  the  problems 
of  the  passing  hour,  if  principle  and  not 
impulse  has  the  clear  right  of  way,  then  the 
soul  is  coming  into  its  own.  If  we  are  content 
to  wait  for  pleasure  till  duty  is  finished,  or 
to  find  our  pleasure  in  duty,  if  we  are  ready 
to  contend  with  inclination  in  order  to  en- 
throne what  is  right,  if  we  are  prepared  to 
suffer  pangs  of  inner  pain  in  the  attempt  to 
vindicate  the  supremacy  of  the  soul,  if  we 
refuse  to  enjoy  a  cheap,  and  cowardly,  passing 
peace  at  the  expense  of  higher  concerns,  then 
we  are  on  the  high  road  of  our  destiny. 

And  when  we  give  the  place  of  emphasis 
to  the  supremacy  of  the  higher  life  we  are 
acting  in  accord  with  the  best  thinking  of  our 
time.  For  it  is  not  only  religion  which  is  pro- 
claiming this  message,  the  tendency  of  modern 
philosophy  and  even  of  science  is  towards  the 
spiritual  interpretation  of  life.  In  the  realm 
of  scientific  thought  we  have  entered  upon  a 
new  day  in  which  a  spiritual  view  of    the 


What  Are  We?  11 

world  in  general,  and  of  man  in  particular,  is 
in  the  ascendency. 

But  when  we  resolve  that  the  angel  in  us 
must  have  the  mastery  over  the  animal  part 
of  us,  we  do  not  therefore  despise  the  animal. 
There  have  been  men  who  when  they  recog- 
nised the  sovereignty  of  the  soul,  gloried  in 
dishonouring  the  body,  and  they  are  not  all 
dead.  There  are  still  a  few  who  think  they 
are  all  soul,  and  pay  no  heed  to  such  things 
as  fresh  air,  rational  diet,  and  exercise.  And 
they  have  their  reward  in  depression,  and  irri- 
tability; and  others  besides  themselves  are 
made  to  suffer  with  them. 

The  broad  tendency  of  our  time,  however, 
is  to  give  a  new  and  exalted  importance  to  the 
care  of  the  body,  because  of  its  intimate  and 
vital  relation  to  the  higher  nature.  It  is  a  false 
interpretation  of  the  temper  of  our  day  to 
conclude  that  the  keen  interest  in  the  physical 
life  is  wholly  for  its  own  sake.  There  is  an 
earnest  spiritual  purpose  behind  much  of  the 
enthusiasm  for  physical  tone.  The  modern 
passion  for  the  social  and  physical  wellbeing 
of  the  poor  is  not  an  attempt  to  ignore  the  soul 
and  glorify  the  body;  on  the  contrary,  there 
is  an  ever  deepening  conviction  that  because 
men  and  women  are  souls,  their  bodies  must 


12     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

therefore  have  the  care  and  reverence  which 
belong  to  them. 

The  humanitarian  movement  must  become 
more  and  more  a  spiritual  movement.    We  are 
gradually  learning  to  make  the  care  of  the 
body  a  matter  of  conscience.    And  not  only  so, 
we  are  throwing  down  artificial  barriers  be- 
tween one  section  of  life  and  another,  both  in 
individual  and  social  existence.     We  are  fast 
coming  to  see  that  life  must  be  unified,  that 
it  can  no  longer  be  lived  in  separate  compart- 
ments which  have  no  real  connection  with  each 
other.     It  is  out  of  date  to  paganise  the  body 
while  we  exalt  the  soul,  and  it  ought  to  be  out 
of  date  to  exalt  the  body  while  we  paganise  the 
soul.     And  socially  it  is  a  worn  out  fiction  to 
confine  spiritual  concerns  to  certain  times  and 
places,  while  whole  realms  of  human  concern 
and  endeavor  are  left  outside  the  pale.     The 
home,  the  market  place,  the  legislature,  the 
institutions  of  amusement,  must  be  brought 
under  the  sway  of  spiritual  reality. 

The  modern  spirit  insists  that  the  whole 
of  life  shall  be  made  a  unity,  that  the  arti- 
ficial divisions  shall  be  swept  away  by  claim- 
ing every  sphere  of  human  interest  for  the 
reign  of  the  spirit.  And  it  is  just  here  that 
the  first  battle  is  fought  in  individual  life,  in 


What  Are  We?  13 

the  attempt  to  maintain  the  supremacy  of  the 
spirit,  and  also  the  efficiency  of  the  body  as 
the  outward  means  of  its  expression.  The 
difference  between  a  medicine  and  a  poison 
often  consists  in  the  proportion  of  the  ingre- 
dients, and  the  difference  between  the  body  as 
a  servant  of  the  spirit  and  as  a  tyrant  over  it 
is  in  the  proportion  of  obedience  given  to  each. 
The  body,  requiring  rest  and  sleep  in  order  to 
be  at  its  best,  may  have  so  much  rest  and  sleep 
that  it  is  pampered  into  weak  softness.  The 
body  requiring  food  may  be  so  indulged  that 
the  animal  suffocates  the  angel. 

The  difficulty  in  giving  the  body  its  true 
place  is  not  so  often  a  matter  of  lack  of  knowl- 
edge, it  is  rather  a  question  of  the  conquest 
of  inclination.  We  all  have  a  fairly  clear  idea 
as  to  when  we  should  get  up  in  the  morning, 
but  after  all  it  is  sometimes  inclination  that 
settles  the  matter.  There  are  multitudes  of 
people  Who  know  perfectly  well  that  the  reason 
for  the  heaviness,  the  inertness,  the  inefficiency, 
of  their  bodies  as  instruments  of  their  higher 
being  is  because  they  eat  too  much  and  too 
rapidly,  but  still  inclination  is  permitted  to  con- 
trol the  situation.  There  are  some  young  peo- 
ple who  know  as  distinctly  as  if  it  were  writ- 
ten on  the  sky  that  their  bodies  would  be  more 


14     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

agile,  and  competent,  and  radiant  servants  of 
their  higher  selves  if  they  fought  more  heroic- 
ally, if  they  got  into  resolute  grips,  with  un- 
worthy inclinations.  They  know  that  they  do 
not  get  the  smooth  working  power  out  of  their 
physical  life  because  they  have  not  kept  the 
animal  under  the  tight  rein  of  subjection  to 
the  spirit. 

We  all  know  that  the  body  cannot  be  at  its 
best  except  in  the  attitude  of  strict  obedience 
to  higher  instincts.  And  we  owe  it  to  our  souls 
to  keep  our  bodies  fit,  for  the  physical  con- 
dition exercises  a  distinct  influence  upon  our 
spiritual  nature.  For  example  it  was  said  by 
some  saints  of  a  former  age,  that  they  had 
periods  in  which  God  left  them  in  spiritual 
darkness.  As  we  look  at  it  to-day  we  do  not 
believe  that  God  did  any  such  thing;  the  ex- 
planation of  the  feelings  of  those  good  people 
mav  have  been  bad  air,  or  feeble  digestion,  or 
lack  of  exercise.  And  to  say  this  is  not  trifling 
with  a  serious  subject,  for  the  proper  care 
of  the  physical  life  is  a  matter  of  definite 
spiritual  significance  because  of  all  that  is 
involved  in  it. 

The  condition  of  the  physical  side  of  our 
being  not  only  affects  its  own  efficiency,  it  not 
only  influences  the  spiritual,  but  it  permeates 


What  Are  We?  15 

our  relation  to  everybody  with  whom  we  come 
in  contact.     We  are  continually  bringing  into 
our   social    relationships    the    results    of    our 
physical  fitness  or  unfitness.      We  carry  the 
victory  over  the  animal  which  we  gained  at  the 
table  to  our  hour  of  companionship  with  a 
friend.    The  freshness,  the  zest,  the  buoyancy, 
which  we  brought  to  our  friend  was  the  fruit 
of  self  control.     We  helped  to  inspire  and 
cheer   him   through   our   sacrifice.      And   we 
may  depress  and  discourage  him  by  means  of 
our    dulness    and    depression   which   are   the 
result  of  our  self  indulgence.      We  owe  it 
as  a  debt  to  the  world  to  be  physically  at 
our  best.     For  most  of  us,  it  ought  to  be  a 
disgrace  to  come  before  the  world  physically 
below  par.     We  have  no  right  to  charge  the 
social  atmosphere  in  which  we  move  with  the 
pessimism,  and  friction,  and  gloom,  which  are 
the  direct  result  of  our  physical  mismanage- 
ment.   We  have  an  obligation  to  bring  to  our 
fellows  the  alertness,  the  laughter,  the  poise, 
which  in  part  spring  from  physical  life  tem- 
pered and  controlled  by  the  highest  within  us. 
But  when  everything  has  been  said  for  the 
influence  of  the  physical  upon  the  psychical 
aspect  of  life,  we  must  not  forget  that  the 
influence  of  the  psychical  upon  the  physical 


16     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

IS  still  greater.  There  are  some  people  who 
can  never  be  physically  normal;  they  are 
invalids,  yet  by  the  heroism  of  the  spirit 
behind  the  body  they  are  able  to  make  tri- 
umphant souls  shine  through  pathetic  limita- 
tions to  such  a  degree  as  to  become  at  once 
a  rebuke  and  an  inspiration  to  those  who 
are  physically  sound.  This  is  why  Christian 
Science,  with  all  its  questionable  hypotheses, 
has  won  so  many  to  its  cause,  it  has  insisted 
that  the  human  spirit  is  master  of  the  situation. 
We  see  plainly  every  day  that  mere  sound 
physical  health  by  itself  may  be  a  very  uninter- 
esting and  useless  thing,  unless  it  is  vitalised 
by  an  alert,  strong,  intelligent  spirit.  In  fact, 
physical  health  in  the  highest  sense  is  scarcely 
possible  without  the  invigorating  influence  of 
a  soAil  holding  the  reins  of  control.  The  soul 
vivifies  the  body.  It  pours  health  into  it.  It 
may  actually  deepen  the  breathing  and  give 
tone  to  the  nerves,  and  curb  the  waste  of  ner- 
vous energy.  Such  a  statement  is  not  a  mere 
vagary.  Physical  science  teaches  us  that  when 
matter  is  examined  back  to  its  minutest  ele- 
ment there  is  spirit,  that  matter  is  a  form  of 
energetic  spirit.  And  that  being  so  it  is  easy 
to  see  how  powerful  the  influence  of  the  soul 
may  be    upon  the  body.      We    have    hardly 


What  Are  We?  17 

dreamed  of  the  enormous  extent  to  which  a 
forceful  spirit  may  affect  the  bodily  life. 

And  when  we  emphasise  the  supreme  fact 
that  we  are  souls,  when  we  refuse  to  live  in  the 
mere  sensations  of  the  body,  when  the  soul 
insists  upon  dominating  the  physical  life  with 
a  firm,  wise,  and  kind  grasp,  then  we  find  our- 
selves. Moods  and  cravings  of  the  lower  self 
will  be  tamed,  or  wiped  out,  or  harnessed  to 
higher  purposes.  The  dominion  of  the  spirit 
will  mean  the  unity,  the  efficiency,  and  the 
satisfaction,  of  the  whole  man. 


II 


WHY  ARE  WE  HERE? 

THERE  are  various  answers  which  may 
be  given  to  this  question,  different  and 
yet  not  necessarily  contradictory.  It 
may  be  said  that  we  are  here  to  do  our  work 
faithfully,  to  serve  our  generation.  Or  the 
answer  may  be  given  that  we  are  here  for  the 
purpose  of  developing  character,  to  turn  the 
potential  soul  with  which  we  are  naturally 
endow'ed  into  a  growing  personality.  These 
statements  instead  of  contradicting  each  other 
simply  deal  with  two  aspects  of  the  same  prob- 
lem. The  end  of  life  is  the  making  of  a  soul, 
and  the  means  by  which  that  end  is  achieved, 
among  other  elements,  of  which  we  shall  speak 
later,  is  by  doing  our  duty,  by  serving  our 
fellowmen. 

By  the  growth  of  a  soul  we  here  mean  the 
same  kind  of  growth  as  that  of  a  seed  into  a 
flower.  There  are  certain  higher  possibilities 
dormant  within  us  which  must  rise  up  from 

18 


Why  Are  We  Here?  19 

being  latent  power  to  become  actual  person- 
ality. But  what  is  the  stuff  out  of  which  per- 
sonality is  realised?  It  is  not  easy  to  answer 
this  question.  Why?  Because  much  of  our 
inner  life  is  below  consciousness,  just  as  an 
iceberg  is  more  under  water  than  above  it. 
The  subconscious  part  of  us  has  depths  like  the 
depths  of  the  sea  which  may  never  be 
explored. 

We  get  a  hint  of  the  deep  currents  and 
strong  tides  within  our  elemental  selves  when 
we  suddenly  receive  a  message  which  awakens 
great  joy  or  sorrow.  We  realise  that  there  are 
forces  within  us  of  which  we  had  never 
dreamed.  In  our  ordinary  life  we  merely 
skim  the  surface  of  what  is  within  us.  It 
requires  some  unusual  individual  or  social 
experience  to  reveal  the  awe-inspiring  realities 
which  slumber  in  human  nature. 

When  we  turn  from  our  subconscious  to  our 
conscious  life  we  find  that  there  are  three  main 
channels  along  which  consciousness  runs,  viz. : 
thought,  feeling,  and  will.  Conscience  is  the 
sense  which  arises  out  of  the  interaction  of  our 
thinking,  feeling  and  willing,  as  these  are  true 
or  false  to  the  light  which  they  possess.  But 
where  does  this  light  come  from?  Light  upon 
how  we  should  act  in  life  comes  partly  from 


20     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

within  ourselves  as  the  expression  of  the  image 
of  God  in  us,  and  partly  from  the  social  and 
religious  surroundings  in  which  we  exist.  And 
our  thinking,  our  feeling  or  emotions,  and  our 
willing  must  be  true  to  the  highest  light  which 
we  find  within  ourselves,  mixed  with  the  high- 
est light  we  can  find  in  the  world.  In  this  task 
the  will  is  the  captain  of  the  ship  of  life, 
thought  and  feeling  are  officers,  and  conscience 
is  the  compass  in  various  stages  of  accuracy  or 
inaccuracy,  according  as  the  mind  has  been 
true  to  the  light  within  ourselves  and  in  the 
v/orld.  We  start  our  moral  career  with  the 
beginnings  of  a  personality,  part  of  which  is 
below  consciousness,  and  part  of  which  is  in 
the  realm  of  consciousness,  which  moves  along 
the  three  lines  we  have  indicated. 

The  will  is  the  primary  force  within  us 
which  secures  the  growth  of  personality.  It 
is  when  the  will  is  in  an  attitude  of  alert  recog- 
nition of  the  highest  possible  light  upon  life 
which  the  mind  can  obtain,  that  it  en- 
deavours to  relate  that  light  to  the  actual  facts 
of  life.  The  supremacy  of  the  will  in  mixing 
light  with  life  is  the  process,  on  the  human 
side,  by  which  the  highest  in  us  reaches  its  true 
stature.  As  a  painter  mixes  paint  with  what 
he  sees  in  a  landscape  upon  a  canvas,  so  the 


Why  Are  We  Here?  21 

will  mingles  what  it  sees  to  be  right  with  the 
common  affairs  of  existence,  and  in  the  proc- 
ess makes  personality  a  growing  fact. 

There  may  be  perplexing  problems  con- 
nected with  the  will  if  we  go  into  the  meta- 
physics of  the  subject.  But  the  supreme  thing 
to  bear  in  mind  here  is  that  we  are  conscious 
that  the  will  has  power  to  choose  between  what 
is  right  and  wrong.  We  are  conscious  that  it 
is  in  the  exercise  of  that  power  of  choice  that 
there  lies  the  opportunity  to  rise  to  our  destiny 
or  to  fall  from  it.  And  all  the  world  acts  upon 
that  assumption.  Therefore  it  is  enough  for  the 
present  to  know  that  we  are  consciously  free 
to  choose  good  or  evil.  And  it  is  absolutely 
necessary  that  both  of  these  should  be  open  to 
us  as  a  choice,  otherwise  it  would  be  impos- 
sible for  us  to  rise.  Explain  good  and  evil 
as  we  please,  (and  we  are  not  concerned  to 
seek  explanations  (the  stubborn  fact  re- 
mains that  it  is  through  the  presence  of  these 
alternatives  confronting  human  life  that  there 
arises  praise  or  blame  as  attaching  to  actions. 

The  possibility  of  good  or  evil  as  a  choice 
must  be  before  us,  otherwise  there  could  be 
no  such  thing  as  moral  distinction  between 
one  act  and  another.  And  if  the  will  were  not 
free  there  could  be  no  real  growth  of  per- 


22     Religion  and  the  Growing  JMind 

sonality.  Wipe  out  good  and  evil,  and  the 
freedom  of  the  will  as  actual  facts,  and  there 
would  be  no  difference  between  the  actions 
of  a  life  and  the  activity  of  a  locomotive. 
There  would  be  no  moral  distinction  between 
the  development  of  a  life  and  the  growth  of  a 
flower.  But  we  do  not  believe  anything  of 
the  kind,  nor  does  the  world  at  large.  Why? 
Because  we  trust  the  reliability  of  our  con- 
sciousness, for  we  are  conscious  that  there  is 
a  choice  of  two  ways,  and  that  we  are  free 
to  make  the  choice,  and  in  the  exercise  of  it, 
according  to  our  highest  light,  we  achieve  per- 
sonality. And  in  the  achieving  of  personality 
we  rise  into  inner  freedom.  By  freedom  we 
mean  that  we  cease  to  be  enslaved  to  anything 
except  to  light  upon  life.  We  become  masters 
of  our  situation.  As  the  enlightened  will 
directs  our  course  we  rise  into  freedom  from 
slavery  to  our  animal  nature.  The  will  com- 
pels the  mind  to  think  according  to  choice, 
and  not  as  suggestions  are  merely  flung  into 
the  mind  by  outside  influences. 

We  have  a  sense  of  freedom  in  the  realm 
of  duty,  not  from  duty  but  in  it.  We  may 
have  tasks  which  press  hard  upon  us  and  yet 
as  the  will  is  resolute  we  are  conscious  that 
nothing  can  harm  the  upward  movement  of 


Why  Are  We  Here?  23 

our  essential  life.  Tasks  may  become  more 
and  more  numerous  and  more  exacting,  but  as 
the  will  maintains  the  supremacy  we  become 
increasingly  conscious  of  inner  freedom.  It 
is  in  this  attitude  that  we  escape  from  the 
tyranny  of  the  outward  show  of  things,  and 
enter  into  communion  with  all  that,  is  real. 
As  the  will  retains  its  tenacity  in  the  problems 
of  translating  truth  into  action  nothing  can 
crush  our  lives.  All  seeming  defeat  is  only 
in  appearance.  For  there  can  be  no  real  defeat 
where  personality  is  growing  stronger  and 
truer.  All  true  success  must  be  born  in  the 
inner  life.  The  so-called  success  which  con- 
tracts and  degrades  personality  is  spurious. 

In  the  making  of  personality  we  are  here 
to  make  connections  with  the  seen  and  the 
unseen  worlds,  through  the  action  of  the  will. 
And  the  fact  that  this  is  possible  reveals  our 
capacity  for  eternal  life.  And  it  is  this  possi- 
bility which  is  the  main  fact  of  our  being. 
There  are  a  great  many  things  true  of  us,  such 
as  our  physical  frailty,  our  mental  ignorance, 
our  moral  imperfections  and  transgressions. 
But  while  we  recognise  all  these  things,  and 
give  them  their  place,  they  do  not  convey  the 
supreme  truth  concerning  us.  The  most  im- 
portant fact  which  puts  every  other  reality  in 


24     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

its  true  relative  position  is  that  we  have  the 
capacity  for  God.  We  are  potentially  the 
children  of  God,  we  can  grasp  the  overtures 
which  God  makes  to  us.  As  human  beings 
we  are  naturally  endowed  with  a  capacity  for 
becoming  partakers  of  eternal  life.  And  when 
we  say  this  we  are  not  here  emphasising 
eternal  life  as  endless  duration  of  existence 
after  this  life  is  over,  which  is  true  enough. 
We  are  here  laying  the  emphasis  upon  a  fact 
which  may  be  true  at  this  moment.  For  we 
have  a  capacity  for  God  here  and  now.  Eter- 
nal life  is  a  present  quality  of  life  as  well  as 
a  future  extension  of  life.  It  may  therefore 
be  a  possession  now  as  well  as  a  hope  here- 
after. We  insist  that  we  possess  the  funda- 
mental possibilities  of  that  type  of  life  within 
us,  and  when  these  possibilities  have  been 
joined  to  the  provision  Which  God  has  made  in 
order  to  lift  us  higher,  of  which  we  shall  speak 
later,  then  eternal  life  becomes  an  actual 
present  experience. 

Let  us  simply  cling  to  the  idea  that  our 
capacity  for  God  is  the  fundamental  reality 
of  our  life.  There  are  many  other  realities, 
to  be  sure,  but  they  are  not  supreme. 

Some  have  contended  that  sin  is  the  greatest 


Why  Are  We  Here?  25 

fact  within  us.  But  that  is  clearly  far  re- 
moved from  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  as  it  is 
untrue  to  the  facts  of  the  case.  Sin  derives  its 
terrible  meaning  from  the  greater  reality  of 
the  Divine  origin  of  man,  otherwise  there 
could  be  no  such  thing  as  sin.  Sin  can  be  sin 
only  as  it  is  recognised  that  human  nature  is 
made  in  the  image  of  God.  Jesus  recognised 
the  tragedy  of  sin  with  a  discernment  with 
which  no  other  saw  it,  but  He  did  not  lay  the 
emphasis  upon  sin  as  the  supreme  reality  in 
human  nature.  When  he  spoke  of  sinning 
men  as  lost,  the  emphasis  was  upon  what  was 
lost.  It  was  the  essential  value  of  what  was 
lost  that  gave  the  fact  of  its  being  lost  its 
solemn  meaning. 

Therefore  we  say  that  we  have  the  possi- 
bilities of  personality  which  may  grow  into 
triumphant  relations  with  the  seen  and  the 
unseen  worlds.  And  as  the  will  is  set  towards 
the  choice  of  the  highest  the  whole  universe 
conspires  in  the  making  of  personality.  It  is 
not  the  wind  that  determines  the  direction  in 
which  a  ship  shall  move,  it  is  the  set  of  the 
sails,  and  it  is  so  in  life. 

But  there  can  be  no  real  winning  of  per- 
sonality if  we  live  in  detached  separation  from 


26     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

the  higher  reahties  of  the  spiritual  world  which 
urge  themselves  upon  us  from  the  unseen.  The 
growth  of  a  flower  is  possible  as  it  is  left  in 
the  soil  and  receives  sunshine,  and  moisture, 
and  air  from  above.  And  such  has  its  counter- 
part in  human  experience;  we  simply  hint  at 
this  now  for  we  shall  deal  with  it  at  length 
later. 

The  help  which  comes  out  from  the  eternal 
world  to  enable  us  to  realise  our  destiny, 
finds  its  opportunity  to  work  itself  into  our 
being  as  we  surrender  ourselves  to  it.  But 
at  the  same  time  the  help  of  God  is  not  given 
in  order  that  we  may  ignore  duty,  but  that  the 
will  may  be  able  to  produce  personality  in  the 
midst  of  duty. 

As  personality  grows  the  horizons  of  life 
widen.  We  see  a  more  interesting  world,  we 
comprehend  more  of  the  meanings  of  life. 
The  veil  Is  lifted  from  the  face  of  nature,  we 
enter  into  its  deeper  messages,  we  intuitively 
understand  more  than  reaches  us  through  our 
senses.  We  have  new  glimpses  of  the  elemen- 
tal realities  of  human  nature,  and  the  invisi- 
ble world  becomes  invested  with  new  interest 
and  values.  Its  remoteness  disappears.  What 
seemed  hostile  is  revealed  as  friendly.  And 
what  was  dark  begins  to  reveal  gleams  of  light. 


Why  Are  We  Here?  27 

So  that  with  the  coming  of  Divine  aid  our 
whole  being  is  able  to  take  its  place  in  the  life 
of  the  world,  and  by  so  doing  personality 
grows,  and  its  instincts  reach  out  to  commune 
with  the  soul  of  everything. 


Ill 

OUR  SENSE  OF  NEED 

THE  growing  mind  becomes  conscious  of 
a  more  or  less  keen  sense  of  need, 
which  expresses  itself  in  a  variety  of 
forms.  The  acute  stage  of  this  sense  of  inner 
need  is  reached  in  most  instances  in  the  early 
teens.  The  predominant  element  in  it  may  be 
an  intellectual  thirst,  a  desire  to  understand 
oneself,  and  one's  relation  to  the  rest  of  the 
universe.  It  is  a  craving  to  be  able  to  bring 
rationality  into  life.  And  this  stage  of  intel- 
lectual awakening  is  sometimes  accompanied 
by  remarkable  insight,  and  an  attitude  of  men- 
tal severity  towards  current  opinions. 

In  seeking  to  help  such  it  is  necessary  for 
older  people  to  be  in  an  attitude  of  intelligent 
sympathy,  requiring  the  exercise  of  a  mixture 
of  candour,  courage,  tact,  and  patience.  But 
the  sense  of  need  in  the  growing  life  may  not 
be  so  definitely  intellectual,  it  may  be  a  vague, 
indefinite  desire  for  something  which  cannot 

28 


Our  Sense  of  Need  29 

be  defined.  It  might  be  called  a  sense  of  ele- 
mental longing,  of  unrest,  of  dissatisfaction. 
Or  it  may  be  a  clearly  defined  sense  of  moral 
need  arising  out  of  a  sense  of  failure  in  duty, 
that  one  has  not  been  true  to  the  highest  light, 
that  one  did  not  half  try,  that  the  will  had 
not  been  really  summoned  to  its  work,  that  it 
had  surrendered  to  inclination  rather  than  to 
duty.  And  therefore  one  is  conscious  of  hav- 
ing been  imtrue  to  his  own  nature,  and  con- 
sequently untrue  to  the  Divine  character  of 
which  one's  own  nature  is  the  image.  There 
is  a  more  or  less  vague  sense  of  having  com- 
mitted an  offence  against  the  Highest  power 
in  the  universe. 

As  a  result  of  this  there  arises  in  some  a 
fear  of  death,  and  a  fear  of  punishment  after 
death,  and  consequently  a  longing  for  Divine 
forgiveness.  In  the  case  of  others  fear  is  not 
the  stronger  element,  it  is  rather  a  longing  for 
help  in  order  to  realise  an  ideal  before  which 
one  has  failed.  Or  the  sense  of  need  is  mani- 
fested by  a  desire  for  a  Divine  leader  in  the 
conduct  of  the  affairs  of  life,  or  for  com- 
panionship and  encouragement  amid  loneli- 
ness and  misunderstanding.  This  variously 
expressed  and  variously  felt  sense  of  need  may 
be  called  a  sense  of  sin,  so  far  as  it  is  the  out- 


30     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

come  of  a  consciousness  of  not  having  been 
true  to  the  highest  Hght. 

But  let  us  clearly  understand  that  a  sense  of 
sin  is  a  fact  apart  from  any  particular  view 
concerning  the  origin  of  man,  and  it  is  quite 
independent  of  any  theory  as  to  how  sin  came 
into  the  world.  The  sense  of  sin  is  a  fact 
revealed  in  human  consciousness.  And  we  all 
trust  the  reliability  of  our  consciousness;  if 
we  did  not,  life  would  be  turned  into  chaos. 

The  fact  of  sin  is  recognised  in  the  best  lit- 
erature of  the  world.  It  is  recognised  by  the 
pilgrim  on  his  way  to  Mecca,  by  the  Hindu  on 
his  journey  for  cleansing  in  the  waters  of  the 
Ganges.  Of  course,  the  deepest  sense  of  sin 
is  felt  where  Christ's  revelation  of  the  mean- 
ing of  sin  has  had  its  opportunity  to  enlighten 
the  human  mind.  For  He  showed  that  sin  is 
first  of  all  an  inner  reality,  even  although  there 
may  not  be  an  outward  expression  of  it  in 
word  or  act.  It  consists  in  the  impure  thought 
controlling  the  mind^  although  the  outward 
life  may  be  blameless.  Sin  is  the  falsehood 
planned  even  before  it  is  spoken.  And  the 
natural  history  of  sin  is  that  one  sin  leads  to 
another.  And  there  is  no  power  of  self- 
recovery.  For  it  is  of  the  nature  of  sin  not 
only  to  multiply,  but  to  bring  the  sense  of  guilt 


Our  Sense  of  Need  31 

with  it.  And  the  human  mind  cannot  rid  itself 
of  guilt.  The  consciousness  of  this  forms  the 
agony  point  of  some  masterpieces  of  literature. 

Thus  it  is  from  the  facts  of  human  need  that 
religion  arises.  It  springs  from  that  instinct 
within  us  which  refuses  to  be  satisfied  with  the 
world,  which  seeks  to  rise  above  every  obstacle 
in  the  quest  for  help,  for  recovery,  for  forgive- 
ness, for  guidance,  for  companionship,  in  the 
making  of  a  personality.  Religion  is  not  an 
artificial  interest  introduced  from  the  outside 
into  human  life;  it  springs  from  the  heart  of 
human  nature  and  its  urgent  necessities.  We 
have  only  to  refer  to  the  story  of  the  religious 
aspirations  of  the  world  to  see  how  profound 
the  needs  of  the  soul  are,  and  how  keen  the 
longing  for  God.  The  long,  tragic  story  of 
the  world's  search  for  God  has  not  discour- 
aged the  world  in  its  quest.  Notwithstand- 
ing the  false  conclusions,  the  gropings  In  the 
black  tempestuous  night,  the  disappointing 
results  in  nation  after  nation,  and  age  after  age, 
the  instinct  for  God  has  persisted,  and  is  the 
freshest,  and  most  elemental,  reality  in  the  life 
of  man  today. 

It  is  not  necessary  for  us,  however,  to  go 
through  the  literature  of  the  religions  of  the 
world  before  we  enter  upon  a  sound  religious 


32     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

experience,  any  more  than  we  must  enquire 
into  the  styles  of  architecture  prevalent  in 
Africa,  or  China  before  we  start  to  build  a 
house.  The  study  of  comparative  religions  is 
a  legitimate,  and  scientific,  pursuit,  and  it  has 
the  reverent  attention  of  expert  thinkers,  but  it 
is  not  on  the  main  line  of  concern  for  the  person 
of  ordinary  training,  and  with  limited  time  at 
his  disposal,  who  is  seeking  spiritual  satisfac- 
tion for  the  urgent  demands  of  his  inner  life. 

There  are  certain  great  conclusions  in  the 
realm  of  religion  which  have  been  reached  in 
the  progress  of  the  world,  which  belong  to  us 
just  as  the  masterpieces  in  art  and  literature 
belong  to  us.  It  is  interesting  to  learn  some- 
thing about  the  beginnings  of  art  and  litera- 
ture, but  when  men  seek  to  produce  art,  or  lit- 
erature, they  seek  to  be  under  the  spell  of  the 
highest  that  has  been  achieved  in  their  sphere. 

And  in  the  same  way  our  point  of  contact 
with  the  religious  knowledge  of  the  world  is  at 
its  highest  point  rather  than  at  its  lowest,  or 
lower,  points.  We  enter  into  the  achievements 
of  the  ages  in  religion  as  well  as  in  other  things. 
Of  course,  the  highest  religion  must  be  that 
which  most  profoundly  answers  the  elemental 
needs  of  human  nature.  But  there  is  one  aspect 
of  modern  thinking  to  which  we  must  refer  be- 


Our  Sense  of  Need  33 

fore  passing  on  to  consider  the  satisfying 
answer  which  has  been  made  to  human  need. 

There  is  a  school  of  thinkers  in  our  day, 
divided  into  varying  shades  of  opinion  blending 
into  each  other,  which  contends  that  there  can 
be  no  intelligent  experience  of  God  on  the  part 
of  human  beings.  We  are  not  here  referring  to 
Atheists  who  dogmatically  deny  that  there  is  a 
God.  We  may  dismiss  them  as  being  prac- 
tically a  negligible  quantity  in  modern  thinking. 
We  refer  to  Agnostics,  who  do  not  deny  the 
existence  of  God.  They  say  that  there  may  be 
a  God,  but  the  limitations  of  the  human  mind 
make  it  impossible  to  find  out  anything  con- 
cerning Him  that  would  be  really  helpful. 
Agnosticism,  therefore,  is  a  dogmatic  philo- 
sophical generalisation  of  a  negative  character. 

And  it  is  only  fair  to  say  that  this  agnostic 
attitude  of  some  modern  minds  may  have  been 
in  part  the  expression  of  a  protest  against  a 
former  interpretation  of  God  which  was  some- 
'  times  a  grotesque  caricature,  and  beneath  the 
moral  sense  of  the  highest  types  of  men.  Or 
agnosticism  may  have  been  in  part  inspired  by 
a  former  unreasoning  attitude  of  hostility,  on 
the  part  of  many  religious  teachers  of  a  by- 
gone generation  against  science,  the  scientific 
spirit,  and  scientific  conclusions.    And  if  either 


34     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

of  these  influences  had  a  real  part  in  driving 
scientific  minds  into  the  agnostic  position,  it  is 
safe  to  say  that  both  low,  anthropomorphic  con- 
ceptions of  God,  and  hostility  to  the  scientific 
temper,  have  to  a  very  large  degree  disappeared 
from  modern  religious  thinking.  But  the 
agnostic  will  contend  that  there  is  more  in  his 
position  than  that.  He  holds  that  the  human 
mind  cannot  interpret  the  First  Cause  of  the 
universe.  He  will  admit  the  fact  of  a  First 
Cause,  a  mysterious,  persistent  reality  behind 
all  created  things,  but  he  affirms  it  to  be  inscru- 
table, unknowable.  But  we  must  answer  the 
agnostic  that  the  human  spirit  cannot  cease  in 
its  search  for  God  because  of  a  philosophical 
statement. 

The  tides  of  the  ocean  will  not  cease  to  rise 
and  fall  because  barriers  have  been  raised  along 
the  ocean  front.  Instinct  is  stronger  than  argu- 
ment. And  the  instincts  of  a  world  of  men 
and  women  are  a  more  formidable  reality  than 
a  generalisation  from  a  small  group  of  honest 
thinkers.  Besides,  we  have  a  right  to  say  that 
the  First  Cause  of  the  universe  may  be  inter- 
preted as  being  all  that  we  ourselves  are  at  our 
best,  and  infinitely  more.  And  even  although 
God  is  infinite,  it  is  not  unreasonable  for  us  to 
think  of  him  as  having  moral  qualities  which 


Our  Sense  of  Need  35 

we  recognise  in  ourselves  as  finite  beings,  and 
especially  when  we  feel  the  instincts  in  our 
nature  urging  us  towards  God  as  a  necessary- 
counterpart  for  our  rational  and  elemental  life. 
And  beyond  all  that,  and  with  even  greater 
emphasis,  let  us  say  that  when  men  declare  God 
to  be  unknowable  they  put  limits  upon  God's 
power  and  willingness  to  reveal  Himself  to  the 
capacity  and  necessity  of  human  nature.  They 
deny  to  God  those  acts  of  self-expression  of 
which  a  man  is,  in  his  measure,  capable.  A  man 
may  make  a  house,  and  write  a  book  and  love 
his  child.  He  can  express  himself  according 
to  the  variety  of  his  natural  endowments.  And 
surely  God  can,  and  has  expressed  Himself 
according  to  the  variety  of  His  nature.  If  we 
find  in  nature  an  expression  of  God  it  is  not  a 
full  expression.  If  we  find  an  expression  of 
God  in  the  laws  which  govern  the  universe, 
there  must  be  a  still  deeper  revelation.  There  is 
no  full  and  satisfying  revelation  of  the  highest 
that  is  in  God  until  we  have  seen,  in  time,  a 
manifestation  of  Him  which  answers  to  the 
highest  in  human  nature  and  which  is  the  re- 
sponse to  its  deepest,  its  most  urgent  needs. 


IV 

GOD'S  ANSWER  TO  OUR  SENSE  OF  NEED 

WHILE  God  is  above  all  that  He  has 
created,  He  is  at  the  same  time  in 
the  midst  of  everything  which  He 
has  made.  Science  is  preaching  this  truth  with 
great  impressiveness  in  our  day.  It  is  not  only 
the  poet  who  speaks  of  the  presence  of  God  in 
the  "  flower  of  the  crannied  wall,"  the  scientist 
is  also  telling  us  of  the  Divine  immanence  in 
the  small  things  of  creation  as  well  as  in  the 
large.  The  modern  physicist  interprets  the 
physical  world  as  an  expression  of  the  life  of 
God  rather  than  as  a  mere  blind  process  of 
material  evolution.  Instead  of  explaining 
spirit  as  arising  out  of  material  elements, 
science  is  making  it  clear  that  material  things 
have  their  origin  in  the  spiritual  reality  behind 
them.  And  it  traces  that  spiritual  reality  to 
be  behind  the  electron  which  is  the  merest 
fragment  of  an  atom,  as  well  as  in  the  midst 
of  the  vastness  of  the  universe. 

36 


God's  Answer  37 

And  if  Gcxi  is  in  what  we  call  the  material 
world  He  is  much  more  in  the  inner  life  of  man. 

And  the  sense  of  God's  presence  has  more  or 
less  persisted  in  the  thoughts  of  men.     They 
have  felt  that  God  was  seeking  to  reveal  Him- 
self to  them  and  through  them,  as  they  were 
able  to  fulfill  the  conditions  in  which  He  mani- 
fests His  purposes.     And  some  men  in  the 
course  of  history  have  heroically  responded  to 
the  promptings  of  the  spirit  of  God  within 
them,    and    they    have    become    leaders    and 
inspirers  of  their  fellows.     But  at  their  best 
those  great  souls  of  past  ages  were  capable 
of  being  channels  of  the  Divine  mind  and  pur- 
pose to  only  a  limited  extent,   and  in  many 
instances  they  mixed  that  partial  revelation  of 
the  purposes  of  God  with  much  that  was  false 
or  crude.     What  those  lofty  characters   re- 
vealed of  the  ways  of  God  was  not  enough  to 
satisfy  the  elemental  needs  and  longings  of  the 
rank  and  file  of  humanity.    And  sometimes  the 
revelation  which  they  made  was  so  adulterated 
with  gross  error  as  to  mislead  large  sections  of 
humanity. 

While  there  were  true  and  various  glimpses 
of  God's  nature  and  will  made  through  out- 
standing men  and  women,  and  while  great 
progress  was  made,  at  the  same  time  the  partial 


38     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

manifestations  of  God,  however  impressive, 
were  not  enough.  Human  nature  could  not 
be  satisfied  until  the  deepest  needs  and  longings 
of  the  soul  saw  a  fuller,  a  richer,  a  larger  rev- 
elation of  the  character  and  purposes  of  God. 
Has  God  answered  those  deep  instincts  of 
human  nature?  Has  God  made  a  fuller 
manifestation,  in  time,  of  His  character,  of 
His  attitude  towards  men,  and  of  His 
purposes  in  and  through  them?  In  try- 
ing to  answer  this  question  we  must  bear 
in  mind  that  if  God  has  made  such  a  revelation 
it  must  be  to  man  as  man,  plain  men  must  be 
able  to  grasp  the  essential  reality  of  it.  If 
God  has  given  a  vision  to  the  human  mind  of 
the  essence  of  His  nature,  that  vision  must  be 
open  to  a  larger  circle  than  is  represented  by 
scholars.  Vision  must  not  require  to  wait  upon 
the  findings  of  even  patient  and  reverent  Bibli- 
cal criticism. 

Success  in  seeing  the  answer  God  has  given 
to  the  elemental  needs  of  life  must  not  depend 
upon  the  rise  and  fall  of  philosophical  systems. 
There  is  a  great  place  for  scholarship  in  the 
realm  of  religion,  but  our  contention  is  that 
God's  message  must  come  to  human  nature  as 
such,  for  there  are  comparatively  few  scholars 
in  the  world,  and  they  make  mental  demands 


God's  Answer  39 

upon  those  who  follow  them  for  equipment 
which  few  possess,  and  their  conclusions 
require  time  to  study  which  few  can  afford  to 
give.  Besides,  scholarship  breaks  up  into 
separate  camps,  and  the  plain  man  has  not  the 
equipment,  or  training,  to  know  which  band  of 
scholars  he  should  follow. 

And  further,  the  revelation  of  God  to  man 
as  man  will  require  the  whole  man  to  under- 
stand it.  If  God  has  revealed  His  heart, 
it  will  be  necessary  for  us  to  exercise  heart, 
as  well  as  head,  in  order  to  comprehend 
it.  If  God  has  spoken  to  human  nature 
in  the  form  of  an  historical  manifestation  of 
Himself,  as  well  as  urging  us  from  within 
our  own  souls  to  seek  Him,  then  our 
whole  being  must  be  summoned  if  the  message 
of  God  is  to  be  intelligible  to  us.  It  is  in  this 
temper  we  must  look  for  the  vision.  We  seek 
for  a  revelation  which  rises  majestically  above 
all  interpretations  of  the  ages,  wise  and  unwise. 
And  in  seeking  to  enter  into  relationship  with 
that  revelation,  we  refuse  to  be  captured  by 
any,  or  every,  council  of  definition.  We  insist 
that  we  shall  not  be  caught  amid  the  smoke, 
and  noise,  and  distraction,  on  the  theological 
battlefield  upon  which  partisans  contend.  We 
dare  not,  the  revelation  of  God  is  too  urgent 


40     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

a  necessity  for  our  practical  life  for  us  to  allow 
problems  which  are  too  much  for  us  to  stand 
between  us  and  our  heart's  desire.  Where 
then  is  the  Divine  revelation?  Let  us  ask  men 
who  knew  no  theories  regarding  that  revela- 
tion. Let  us  ask  those  who  simply  saw,  and 
having  seen,  were  satisfied.  But  does  that  not 
involve  us  in  the  whole  question  of  Biblical 
criticism?  When  we  turn  to  the  testimony  of 
the  men  of  the  first  century  as  recorded  in  the 
New  Testament  are  we  not  in  the  thick  of 
controversy  ? 

No,  if  we  cling  to  the  places  of  emphasis, 
if  we  seek  in  the  first  instance  the  broad  fact 
rather  than  the  minutiae  of  the  records.  For 
we  are  seeking  a  person;  God  revealed  Him- 
self in  a  life.  And  there  is  enough  in  the 
broad  outline  of  the  history  of  that  life  to  lead 
us  to  Him,  especially  when  we  bear  in  mind 
that  the  testimony  concerning  that  life  is  not 
confined  to  the  experience  of  men  of  the  first 
century.  That  testimony  has  an  unbroken 
succession  through  the  centuries  until  this  hour. 

H  we  insist  upon  wading  through  literature 
which  gathers  around  the  details  of  the  record 
of  the  life  of  Jesus  we  may  be  confused,  and 
mentally  suffocated  in  the  process.  And  many 
earnest  growing  minds  have  been  side-tracked 


God's  Answer  41 

into  hopeless  confusion  in  this  attempt.  There 
is  enough  beyond  controversy  to  start  with. 
The  great  fact  of  Christ  is  undisputed.  And 
the  experience  Which  has  grown  out  of  the 
fact  makes  it  possible  for  us  to  put  it  to  the  test. 
We  do  not  need  a  great  deal  of  testimony  to 
lead  us  to  Christ.  We  do  not  insist  upon  a 
great  deal  of  it  when  we  put  anything  else  to 
the  proof.  If  we  seek  a  medical  specialist  the 
testimony  which  we  get  beforehand  concerning 
him  is  not  enormous,  it  may  be  very  slender, 
indeed.  And  the  more  desperate  our  case  is, 
the  less  insistent  we  are  upon  getting  a  great 
volume  of  testimony.  We  are  ready  to  start 
for  the  specialist  with  very  small  hope,  with  a 
minimum  of  encouragement.  Our  friends  may 
pathetically  shake  their  heads  as  we  go.  But 
we  know  the  great  thing  is  not  so  much  the 
testimony  as  the  personal  experience  which  we 
have  at  the  hands  of  the  physician.  And  an 
unpromising  outlook  may  turn  out  to  have  a 
most  wonderful  result  in  actual  experience. 

And  that  is  the  principle  upon  which  we 
approach  Jesus  as  the  revelation  of  God  to 
human  need. 

The  testimony  of  the  men  of  the  first  cen- 
tury was  that  they  had  a  completely  satisfying 
revelation  of  God  in  Jesus.    That  was  the  ex- 


42     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

perlence  of  one  of  the  greatest  minds  of  that 
early  age.  Saul  of  Tarsus  may  never  have  seen 
Jesus  in  the  flesh,  and  his  vi^hole  training  and 
surroundings  were  against  his  ever  seeing 
anything  in  Jesus  that  would  interest  him. 
The  strong  likelihood  is  that  the  first  glimpse 
which  Saul  ever  obtained  was  through  the 
transfigured  life  and  testimony  of  Stephen. 
And  after  that  he  saw  his  Lord  as  a  person 
who  had  risen  out  of  local  history  and  had 
become  a  spiritual  presence.  No  literature 
could  ever  have  reached  Saul  of  Tarsus,  it  was 
a  testimony,  it  was  the  living  Christ  Himself. 
And  he  came  to  know  Christ  far  better  than 
most  of  the  people  who  had  seen  and  heard 
the  Master  during  His  life-time  on  earth.  And 
from  that  spiritual  knowledge  of  Christ  Saul 
when  he  became  St.  Paul  went  back  to  assim- 
ilate all  the  historical  knowledge  of  Jesus  that 
he  could  obtain  from  those  who  had  known 
Him  in  the  days  of  His  flesh.  The  point  we 
emphasise  here  is  that  St.  Paul  did  not  rise 
from  large  historical  knowledge  to  a  spiritual 
knowledge  of  Christ.  The  process  was  rather 
that  he  first  of  all  heard  a  testimony  regarding 
Christ,  then  he  had  an  experience  of  Him  and 
after  that  he  gradually  entered  into  the  his- 
torical facts  of  the  earthly  life  of  his  master. 


God's  Answer  43 

And  that  way  of  approach  is  just  as  open  to  us 
as  it  was  to  St.  Paul.  It  is  even  more  open  to 
us,  because  Saul  of  Tarsus  naturally  repudiated 
the  whole  earthly  career  of  Jesus,  until  the 
time  that  he  had  a  spiritual  experience  of  Him. 
We  have  no  such  bitter  repugnance  to  the 
story  of  the  life  of  Jesus  as  Saul  had. 
Besides,  we  have  the  witness  of  the  ages  to 
help  us.  Let  us  cling  with  the  utmost  tenacity 
to  the  fact  that  St.  Paul  had  an  experience  of 
the  living  presence  of  Jesus  before  he  made  any 
explanations,  or  theories,  regarding  that  pres- 
ence. It  was  Christ  himself  who  constituted 
the  supreme  revelation  of  God  to  the  soul  of 
the  Apostle.  It  was  that  presence  who  gave ' 
him  all  that  changed  his  life,  and  thought,  and 
career.  He  had  an  experience  before  he  made 
a  theological  interpretation.  That  is  the 
supreme  fact.  Let  that  fact  hold  us  before  we 
get  confused  with  other  issues.  Let  us  not 
lose  the  place  of  emphasis.  Let  us  keep  first 
things  first.  St.  Paul  testified  that  Jesus  sat- 
isfied his  soul,  and  his  reason,  as  a  revelation  of 
the  heart  of  God.  And  the  testimony  of  the 
Apostle  has  been  carried  down  to  us  by  the 
accumulating  evidence  of  centuries  of  experi- 
ence. And  the  experience  has  expressed  itself 
in   a   devotional   and   experimental   literature 


44     Religion  and  the  Growing  JMind 

which  satisfies  us,  which  confirms  the  essential 
harmony  of  the  Christian  witnesses. 

Therefore  we  say  that  Christ  as  the  revela- 
tion of  God  satisfies  the  inner  needs  of  man. 
That  is  a  fact  to  which  countless  thousands 
could  swear  in  a  court  of  law.  And  men  and 
women  have  been  so  possessed  of  the  passion- 
ate conviction  that  Christ  answered  the  ulti- 
mate needs  of  life  that  they  have  hurled  them- 
selves against  the  difficulties,  the  cruelty,  and 
the  ignorance  of  the  whole  world  in  order  to 
tell  their  fellows  of  Him.  And  they  have  met 
with  a  response,  but  the  numbers  who  have 
responded  are  not  the  supreme  sign  of  the 
revelation  of  God  in  Christ.  It  is  the  depths 
of  hunger  and  of  despair  which  He  has  an- 
swered, it  is  the  transformation  of  soul  which 
He  has  effected,  that  is  the  criterion. 

We  do  not  here  attempt  to  interpret  the  con- 
sciousness of  Jesus,  as  recorded  in  the  Scrip- 
tures. We  do  not  seek  to  put  the  teaching  of 
Jesus  into  categories.  We  do  not  here  en- 
deavour to  place  emphasis  upon  any  one  or 
more  aspects  of  His  life  or  message.  All  that 
has  its  own  important  place.  We  simply  seek 
to  see  the  personality  of  Christ,  with  enough 
of  an  historical  background  to  give  clearness 
to  the  outlines  of  His  abiding  presence.     We 


God's  Answer  45 

appeal  to  the  spiritual  sense  of  the  ages,  and 
of  our  own  times  for  witness  that  the  presence 
of  Christ  is  a  reality,  a  reality  as  great  as  any 
other  reality.  Christ  satisfies  those  cravings 
of  the  inner  life,  which  are  as  real  as  any  other 
cravings.  We  insist  that  He  can  be  put  to  the 
proof  to-day.  The  case  for  His  presence  and 
power  stands  or  falls  by  what  He  can  do  for 
the  enlightenment,  inspiration,  and  recovery  of 
lives. 

We  do  not  for  a  moment  say  that  the  fact 
of  the  living  Christ  is  all  that  men  will  seek  to 
know.  They  naturally  seek  to  go  back  to  read 
and  appropriate  all  that  He  said  and  did.  But 
they  go  back  with  an  experience  of  Christ  Him- 
self. While  on  the  other  hand  without  an  ex- 
perience of  Him  there  is  great  danger  of  being 
lost  in  the  details  of  Biblical  criticism,  in  con- 
troversies regarding  places  of  emphasis.  Let 
us  steadily  remember  that  the  theological 
approach  to  Christ  is  one  thing,  the  religious 
approach  another. 

There  are  comparatively  few  able  to  enter 
upon  the  theological  approach,  as  we  have 
already  hinted.  But  multitudes  have  ap- 
proached the  living  presence  of  Christ,  both 
wise  and  ignorant  men,  those  who  were  expert 
in  theology  and  those  who  could  not  even  read 


46     Religion  and  the  Growing  ]\Iind 

the  Bible.  We  dare  not  turn  God's  revelation 
to  human  need  into  an  academic  question.  And 
therefore  anything  that  would  tend  to  im- 
prison, or  bewilder,  us,  anything  that  would 
lead  us  along  lines  for  which  we  have  neither 
time  nor  aptitude,  and  regarding  which  even 
our  teachers  have  not  arrived  at  definite  con- 
clusions, we  must  put  upon  one  side  until  we 
have  seen  the  abiding  Master  Himself.  After 
that  let  us  go  back  to  the  details,  to  the  discus- 
sions, it  may  be,  if  we  have  time  and  ability. 
But  our  spiritual  sense  will  guide  us,  and  then 
we  shall  assimilate  such  parts  of  the  Scriptures 
as  suit  our  stage  of  development,  and  thus 
enter  upon  a  progressive  appropriation  of 
truth. 

But  the  main  thing  is  that  we  shall  so  assim- 
ilate the  spiritual  realities  of  the  Bible,  that  we 
shall  turn  its  literature  into  life,  and  what  we 
thus  make  our  own  is  beyond  all  criticism.  The 
believer  thus  becomes  independent  of  the  critic. 
Let  it  be  clearly  understood  that  we  are  not 
here  pleading  for  intellectual  indolence,  or 
timidity,  when  we  insist  upon  steering  clear  of 
controversial  matters  upon  which  great  and 
good  men  differ.  We  are  simply  pursuing  a 
common-sense  policy  that  our  whole  nature  and 
not  merely  a  section  of  cfur  nature  shall  seek 


God's  Answer  47 

Christ  as  the  revelation  of  God.  The  needs  of 
our  soul  are  so  urgent  as  to  make  it  impossible 
for  us  to  submit  to  being  sidetracked  by  ques- 
tions in  scholarship  which  may  not  be  settled  in 
this  generation,  and  which  when  settled  by  the 
few  may  never  be  accepted  by  many.  Christ 
is  not  imprisoned  in  a  segment  of  history.  He 
is  in  the  Scriptures  and  He  is  also  here.  He 
lives  and  satisfies  the  actual  needs  of  men  and 
women  with  whom  we  come  in  contact  every 
day. 


V 


HOW  DO  WE  ENTER  INTO  THE  KNOWLEDGE 

OF  CHRIST? 

THAT  there  are  various  ways  into  the 
friendship  of  Christ  we  are  convinced 
by  the  experience  of  individual  Chris- 
tians. We  may  have  an  ideal  way  in  our 
minds,  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  there  is  no  one 
method.  St.  Peter  came  to  know  Jesus  along 
one  path,  and  St.  Paul  by  quite  another.  St. 
Peter  approached  his  Master  through  the  sim- 
ple facts  of  the  human  life  of  Jesus,  He  fol- 
lowed on  till  the  great  personality  mastered 
him.  St.  Paul  came  to  know  Christ  from  the 
opposite  direction.  He  first  entered  into  fel- 
lowship with  the  spiritual  Christ,  and  thus  was 
led  to  the  human,  the  historical,  facts  in  the 
earthly  life  of  Jesus.  St.  Peter  entered  into  the 
friendship  of  his  Lord  by  what  we  would  call 
the  historical  method,  and  St.  Paul  by  the 
spiritual.  And  these  two  paths  of  approach 
are  still  travelled  by  true  disciples,  and  they 

48 


The  Knowledge  of  Christ  49 

are  not  contradictory,  they  are  the  counterparts 
of  each  other.  Some  in  our  own  day  have 
come  into  the  knowledge  of  Christ  through  the 
study  of  the  Scriptures.  That  is  to  say, 
through  the  story  of  the  events  by  v^hich  St. 
Peter  was  led  up  to  recognise  Jesus  as  Lord. 
Some  others  have  been  introduced  to  Christ 
through  a  direct  sense  of  His  presence.  A 
negro  woman,  a  servant  in  the  home  of  a  the- 
ological professor,  was  a  devoted  disciple  of 
Christ,  but  she  could  not  read.  When  her  mas- 
ter taught  her  to  read  the  New  Testament  she 
said  she  had  experienced,  and  already  knew, 
the  truths  which  she  found  there. 

We  must  bear  in  mind  that  there  are  many 
true  Christians  throughout  the  world  who  can- 
not read,  and  there  always  have  been.  While 
we  doubtless  have  in  our  minds  a  method  of 
entering  into  the  knowledge  of  our  Lord  which 
we  consider  to  be  the  highest,  and  the  most 
honouring  to  the  Scriptures,  we  dare  not  dog- 
matically lay  down  our  way  as  the  only  way, 
in  the  face  of  the  experience  of  so  many  who 
have  not  come  by  our  path  into  a  discipleship 
which  is  quite  as  real  as  our  own. 

If  we  come  to  a  knowledge  of  Christ  through 
the  testimony  or  saintly  life  of  a  believer  we  do 
not  therefore  dishonour  the  Scriptures.     On 


50     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

the  contrary,  we  go  back  to  the  Scriptures  with 
a  freedom  of  soul,  with  a  spiritual  insight 
which  enables  us  to  nmke  the  Bible  increasingly 
our  own,  by  a  process  of  spiritual  assimilation. 
And  at  the  same  time  we  are  kept  from  being 
confused  by  perplexities  which  are  not  of  pri- 
mary importance  and  from  bewildering  dis- 
cussions which  gather  around  controversial 
points.  Spiritual  experience  is  thus  the  per- 
manent basis  of  a  vital  relation  to  the  Bible. 
And  it  is  the  establishment  of  experience  be- 
tween the  needs  of  our  soul  and  the  living 
Master  which  becomes  the  guarantee  of  our 
abiding  interest  in  the  Bible  in  a  spiritually 
free,  and  spiritually  profitable  way. 

But  having  accepted  testimony  as  it  urges  us 
to  put  the  living  Christ  to  the  test  for  our- 
selves, how  shall  we  proceed?  How  shall  we 
make  Christ  real  to  our  elemental  life?  How 
shall  His  presence  be  made  real  to  us?  We 
must  believe  that  He  is  actually  here  with  us 
at  this  moment,  as  really  here  now  as  He  ever 
was  with  His  disciples  in  the  days  of  His 
flesh.  When  we  say  this  the  mind  will  at  once 
seek  for  signs  of  His  presence.  For  the  mind 
may  have  preconceived  notions  as  to  certain 
sensations,  certain  experiences,  which  should 
take  place  when  Christ  is  really  present. 


The  Knowledge  of  Christ  51 

St.  John  the  Baptist  had  certain  notions  as 
to  what  Jesus  would  do  when  He  came,  and 
when  Jesus  did  not  manifest  Himself  as  St. 
John  had  expected,  he  began  to  doubt  whether 
Jesus  was  after  all  the  personality  he  had  taken 
Him  to  be.  This  is  a  danger  which  besets  us 
all.  n  we  are  to  put  Christ  to  the  test  we  must 
believe  that  Christ  is  actually  here,  apart  from 
all  our  preconceived  notions  as  to  how  He  will 
manifest  Himself.  We  must  believe  He  is 
here  with  us,  even  when  we  have  no  feelings 
whatever  or  in  the  possession  of  feelings 
within  us  which  seem  to  absolutely  contradict 
the  reality  of  His  presence. 

We  must  not  interpret  His  presence  accord- 
ing to  our  moral  deservings,  for  if  we  were  to 
do  that,  most  of  us  would  put  Him  very  far 
from  us.  His  presence  with  us  is  not  the  result 
of  anything  which  we  have  done  to  secure  it. 
If  we  desire  him,  and  if  we  are  willing  by  His 
aid  to  make  His  will  the  rule  of  our  lives,  it  is 
in  no  sense  presumption  to  take  it  completely 
for  granted  that  He  is  now  present  with  us. 

Of  course,  there  is  a  strong  natural  tendency 
to  look  for  signs  of  His  presence.  There  is  an 
almost  irresistible  temptation  to  doubt  the 
actual  presence  of  Christ  unless  there  are  some 
indications,  some  manifestations  of  feeling  to 


52     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

verify  it.  Some  seekers  after  Christ  are  mis- 
led by  the  unusual  experiences  of  which  they 
have  read  in  the  biographies  of  distinguished 
Christians,  and  unless  some  similar  emotions 
spring  up  in  their  own  lives  they  are  inclined 
to  think  that  their  time  of  spiritual  change  has 
not  yet  come.  But  this  is  a  grave  mistake. 
We  must  believe  that  Christ  is  in  our  lives 
without  anything  to  verify  it  except  the  testi- 
mony which  we  have  read  in  the  Scriptures,  or 
the  testimony  of  those  who  profess  to  have  His 
presence  in  their  lives. 

And  this  venture  of  faith  will  justify  itself 
very  quickly.  For  we  shall  hear  the  voice  of 
Christ  speaking  to  us.  We  shall  become  con- 
scious of  His  actual  nearness.  But  we  must 
not  forget  that  the  presence  of  Christ  is  one 
thing,  and  the  outward  sign  of  that  presence 
is  another  thing.  While  Christ  will  give 
unmistakable  signs  of  His  presence,  at  the 
same  time  there  will  be  periods  when  every 
mirror  of  feeling  in  which  we  have  seen  Him 
will  be  obscured,  or  it  may  be  that  every  mirror 
through  which  we  have  beheld  Him  shall  seem 
broken,  and  we  shall  be  flung  back  upon  trust 
that  He  is  with  us,  without  a  single  reflection 
of  the  fact  in  our  feeling.  If  we  interpret  the 
presence  of  the  living  Master  by  certain  sen- 


The  Knowledge  of  Christ         53 

sations,  we  are  thus  resting  upon  effects  rather 
than  upon  the  cause  of  the  effects,  consequently 
when  the  effects  vanish  we  are  in  confusion. 
But  if  we  gratefully  accept  all  verifications  of 
the  nearness  of  our  Lord  without  resting  upon 
them,  without  thinking  them  to  be  absolutely 
necessary,  then  when  they  happen  to  disappear 
we  are  not  in  confusion  for  we  have  been  walk- 
ing by  faith,  and  not  by  sight. 

It  is  the  will  that  is  the  point  of  contact  with 
Christ,  and  not  emotion.  The  feelings  may  be 
a  very  great  aid  to  the  will,  but  they  must  never 
have  the  mastery  over  the  will.  And  will  must 
learn  to  act  very  often  without  their  help. 
Feelings  may  desert  the  will,  they  may  be  in 
rebellion  against  the  will,  but  the  will  must 
determine  to  believe  in  the  companionship  of 
Christ.  For  as  Professor  William  James  con- 
tended we  can  will  to  believe.  It  is  possible 
to  put  the  will  on  the  side  of  our  beliefs,  or  of 
our  doubts.  And  we  do  it  consciously  or 
unconsciously  all  the  time  in  our  human  rela- 
tionships. We  will  to  disbelieve  slanders 
against  those  for  whom  we  have  an  affection 
and  in  whom  we  trust.  And  if  we  have  a  prej- 
udice against  anyone,  it  is  not  difficult,  unfor- 
tunately, to  believe  an  unkind  rumour  regard- 
ing him.    The  human  will  must  always  play  an 


54     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

important  part  in  our  beliefs.  And  it  is 
because  the  will  is  involved  that  ethical  value 
attaches  to  the  fact  of  believing.  It  is  through 
the  action  of  the  will  in  relation  to  all  the  light 
that  is  shed  upon  us  from  the  Scriptures,  from 
Christ  and  from  our  surroundings,  that  we 
make  personality. 

And  as  we  will  to  believe  in  Christ,  He  will 
reveal  Himself  to  our  need.  For  the  living 
Christ  is  a  Divine  intelligence  with  a  distinct 
message  to  the  mind,  the  imagination,  the  will, 
the  conscience,  to  the  elemental  life.  Christ 
carries  in  His  living  personality  now  the  fruits 
of  every  phase,  and  stage,  of  His  earthly  work 
of  redemption.  He  brings  into  the  present 
hour  of  our  need  the  fruits  from  the  harvest 
of  His  human  experiences.  He  has  left  noth- 
ing of  His  achievements  in  the  past.  He  has 
been  bearing  the  spiritual  results  of  His  glori- 
ous work  through  the  centuries  unto  this  day. 
All  that  He  did  for  man  in  the  far  away  past. 
He  offers  to  men  now. 

Whatever  was  necessary  in  order  to  make 
the  free  offer  of  forgiveness  Christ  fulfilled, 
and  He  brings  the  results  with  His  own  hand 
straight  to  the  points  of  need  in  human  life. 
And  what  Christ  does  for  us  and  in  us  must  be 
accepted  as  His  presence  is  accepted,  not  in  the 


The  Knowledge  of  Christ         55 

first  instance  through  feehng,  but  by  simple 
trust.  We  may  have  absolutely  nothing  upon 
which  to  rest  but  His  promise,  and  the  testi- 
mony of  believers  throughout  the  ages,  who 
have  lived  and  died  in  peace  through  believing. 
That  attitude  of  faith  will  bear  its  own  fruit 
of  abiding  peace,  as  it  has  in  the  lives  of  the 
redeemed  who  have  gone  before  us,  if  we  per- 
sist, if  our  faith  fights  its  battle  against  all 
that  seeks  to  overthrow  it. 

Christ  seeks  to  cleanse  the  past,  to  enlighten, 
inspire,  and  empower,  the  present  life,  and  to 
create  hope  for  the  future.  He  seeks  to  shew 
the  meaning  of  life,  the  use  of  discipline,  the 
wisdom  of  trust  in  a  Divine  providence  in  life. 
Beyond  the  intellectual  satisfaction  which 
Christ  seeks  to  inspire,  there  is  also  the  enlight- 
enment of  the  mind  upon  the  practical  affairs 
of  life.  Christ  would  so  lead  those  who  trust 
Him,  that  they  may  become  not  the  mere  echo 
of  their  surroundings,  but  original  contributors 
to  the  life  and  progress  of  society.  For  the 
mind  inspired  by  Christ  is  part  of  the  truly 
progressive  element  in  human  history.  It  has 
a  freshness,  a  uniqueness,  an  originality,  which 
makes  it  distinct  and  individual,  rather  than 
living  in  an  attitude  of  mere  servitude  to  social 
precedent. 


VI 


WHAT    IS   THE    BOND    THAT    BINDS   US    TO 

CHRIST? 

HOW  shall  the  vital  bond  between  per- 
sonality and  the  living  Christ  be 
maintained?  The  answer  of  the 
New  Testament  and  of  the  centuries  of  spirit- 
ual experience  is  that  the  means  of  abiding  fel- 
lowship with  Christ  is  through  faith  and  obedi- 
ence. We  shall  here  consider  only  the  first  of 
these  two  conditions.  Many  people  say  they 
have  not  faith.  They  contend  that  this  is  their 
great  lack.  If  they  could  in  some  way  obtain 
more  faith  the  spiritual  life  would  become  for 
them  a  working  reality.  But  as  a  matter  of  fact 
>  faith  is  an  instinct  inherent  in  our  human 
nature.  It  is  the  instinct  which  relates  us  to  the 
world  in  which  we  live.  Without  the  exercise 
of  faith  it  would  be  quite  impossible  to  get 
through  a  single  day  of  life.  It  is  necessary 
when  we  sit  down  to  breakfast,  when  we  take 
a  train,  when  we  conclude  a  bargain.  Without 
it  life  would  be  reduced  to  chaos.     So  that  it 

56 


What  Binds  Us  to  Christ?        57 

is  a  mistake  for  any  of  us  to  say  we  have  not 
faith.  Of  course  the  Bible  says,  "All  men  have 
not  faith,"  but  it  is  speaking  of  faith  in  God, 
and  we  all  recognise  the  absolute  truth  of  that 
statement.  However,  we  all  have  the  capacity 
for  faith  in  God  and  in  order  to  have  faith  in 
Him  we  do  not  require  any  new  faculty  added 
to  our  being. 

While  we  all  possess  the  faith  instinct,  it  is 
capable  of  being  developed  or  degraded.  Just 
as  ivy  may  be  trained  to  climb  up  the  wall,  or 
to  creep  along  the  ground,  so  faith  may  be 
trained  to  rise  from  being  exercised  between 
man  and  man  to  express  itself  towards  God, 
or  it  may  manifest  itself  in  purely  earthly  re- 
lationships and  in  few  of  those.  Faith  is  not 
merely  an  expression  of  the  intellect.  It  has 
a  distinctly  intellectual  element.  But  it  also 
proceeds  from  the  imagination,  from  the  will, 
from  the  elemental  self.  It  is  an  outgoing  of 
the  whole  personality,  it  is  expressed  at  the 
focus  point  of  the  entire  life.  And  the  spirit 
of  God  is  within  us  not  to  create  faith,  but  to 
train  it  upwards.  The  Holy  Spirit  seeks  to 
lead  faith  to  its  supreme  object. 

Faith  is  capable  of  various  definitions  ac- 
cording to  the  point  of  view  from  which  we 
look  at  it.    For  our  present  purpose  faith  may 


58     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

be  defined  as  belief  in  the  unseen  presence  of 
Christ.      It   clothes   with   reality   a  presence, 
regarding  whom  our  senses  do  not  inform  us, 
and  our  powers  of  ratiocination  cannot  wholly 
reduce  the  reality  of  His  presence  to  a  demon- 
stration.    Every  venture  of  faith  involves  the 
element  of  risk.     Risk  is  everywhere  where 
faith  is  concerned.    And  faith  has  to  be  exer- 
cised in  our  relation  to  everything.     The  man 
who  will  not  exercise  faith  because  there  is  a 
risk,  will  not  venture  anywhere,  for  there  is 
no  such  thing  in  this  world  as  absolute  knowl- 
edge concerning  anything.  Faith  is  the  pioneer 
section  of  reason.    It  is  reason  without  reason- 
ing.   But  it  does  not  fear  reasoning.    It  invites 
it  to  follow,  if  reason  recognises  that  faith 
has  its  own  legitimate  place,  and  if  the  rea- 
soning powers  recognise  that  they  must  pos- 
sess the  ability  to  handle  the  problems  with 
which  they  undertake  to  deal.     For  it  is  not 
brave  to  go  into  a  current  which  is  too  much 
for   one's   strength;    it   may   be   a   form   of 
suicide. 

And  some  who  have  neither  the  mental 
training,  nor  the  time  necessary,  become  sub- 
merged in  an  intellectual  current  because  they 
have  tried  prematurely  to  reason  out  that  which 
in  the  meantime  should  be  humbly  accepted, 


What  Binds  ITs  to  Christ?        59 

because  of  the  lack  of  mental  apparatus  to  do 
otherwise.  The  wisest  men  have  mental  limit- 
ations, and  it  is  not  cowardice  but  bravery  to 
recognise  the  fact.  It  was  one  of  the  first 
things  confessed  by  Descartes  as  he  sought  to 
build  up  his  philosophical  method.  Faith  has 
rights.  And  it  is  on  safe  ground  when  it 
asserts  its  right  to  believe,  when  it  refuses  to 
be  swept  off  its  ground,  so  long  as  it  cannot 
be  proved  that  its  claims  are  irrational.  And 
there  is  nothing  whatever  irrational  in  the  faith 
of  any  man  venturing  to  trust  the  unseen  living 
Christ. 

Faith  is  not  an  end  in  itself.  It  must  not  be 
taken  up  with  itself.  That  is  a  form  of  self- 
consciousness,  which  results  in  confusion,  if 
not  in  paralysis.  Faith  is  healthy  when  it  is 
taken  up  with  its  object,  forgetting  all  about  its 
own  strength  or  weakness,  its  quality  or  quan- 
tity. Christian  people  are  sometimes  ridiculed 
or  censured,  from  making  much  of  the  import- 
ance of  faith.  But  if  we  say  that  we  cannot 
get  water  from  a  well  without  turning  the 
handle  of  the  well,  we  are  not  giving  undue 
prominence  to  the  handle,  we  are  simply  stat- 
ing the  way  by  which  we  reach  the  water.  We 
do  not  exaggerate  the  importance  of  a  key  if 
we  say  that  we  cannot  get  into  a  safe  without 


60     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

it.  And  in  the  same  way  faith  is  the  means  by 
which  we  enter  into  that  contact  with  Christ 
which  secures  for  us  what  He  has  to  bestow 
upon  our  need.  But  faith  will  not  establish 
relations  with  Christ  unless  the  life  is  pos- 
sessed by  genuine  desire  for  what  Christ  has  to 
give.  To  try  to  exercise  faith  towards  our 
Lord  while  we  still  desire  what  we  know  to  be 
Wrong,  is  to  have  one  part  of  our  being  cancel 
the  efforts  of  another  part  of  our  being.  The 
thing  cannot  be  done.  Our  moral  nature  is  gov- 
erned by  law  just  as  much  as  physical  nature, 
and  if  steam  will  not  rise  from  water  until 
the  water  has  reached  a  certain  temperature, 
neither  will  faith  be  able  to  make  connection 
with  Christ  until  there  is  a  willingness  to  be 
made  Christlike. 

Let  it  be  clearly  understood  that  we  are  not 
insisting  upon  moral  attainment,  but  upon 
willingness  to  be  helped  towards  attainment. 
We  may  be  too  weak  even  to  try  to  attain,  we 
may  be  too  discouraged.  But  that  need  not, 
should  not,  hinder  faith.  The  only  thing  that 
will  surely  paralyse  faith  towards  Christ  is  the 
desire  to  persist  in  what  He  disapproves.  And 
that  is  surely  as  it  should  be.  Christ  cannot  lend 
Himself  to  anything  that  is  in  open  revolt 
against  the  spirit  of  moral  progress.    But  He 


What  Binds  Us  to  Christ?         61 

will  stoop  to  the  lowest  depths  to  rescue  the 
weakest,  the  most  sinful,  who  honestly  desires 
to  be  made  Christlike.  This  attitude  may  be 
nothing  more  than  desire,  it  may  be  too  abso- 
lutely feeble  to  be  anything  more.  It  may  not 
express  itself  in  tears,  or  even  in  deep  sorrow. 
That  will  doubtless  come  later  on.  And  it  is  a 
great  mistake  to  withhold  the  exercise  of  faith 
until  a  certain  amount  of  sorrow  has  been  felt. 
Who  is  to  say  when  a  sufficient  quantity  of 
sorrow  has  been  forthcoming?  Repentance 
not  necessarily  in  the  first  instance  an  expres- 
sion of  sorrow,  it  is  the  expression  of  the  res- 
olution to  be  wholly  a  genuine  man,  trusting 
that  Divine  power  shall  be  available  to  turn  that 
resolution  into  a  growing  fact.  It  is  then  that 
faith  has  the  right,  and  the  power,  to  claim 
what  Christ  has  to  bestow  for  the  forgiveness, 
the  recovery,  and  the  expansion  of  a  soul. 

Faith  then  is  not  a  mere  intellectual  assent, 
w'hile  the  rest  of  the  inner  life  clings  to  what 
is  consciously  wrong.  That  would  not  only 
establish  a  dualism  divorcing  religion  from 
practical  life,  but  it  would  be  an  im- 
moral use  of  religion.  And  such  a  religion 
wherever  it  may  exist  is  a  travesty  of 
the  religion  of  Christ.  It  completely  fails  to 
recognise  that  our  Lord  lends  His  presence  and 


62     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

His  power  only  to  the  redemption,  and  the 
development  of  character.  Faith  is  the  out- 
going of  the  whole  man  in  a  unified  desire  ex- 
pressed through  the  will  claiming  and  rejoic- 
ing in  the  help  of  Christ.  The  will  must  ever 
be  the  supreme  element  in  the  action  of  true 
faith.  And  Christ  in  His  appeal  for  faith  chal- 
lenges the  will.  And  when  the  will  urges  faith 
to  cling  to  the  unseen  presence  of  Christ  faith 
will  be  assailed.  It  will  be  harassed  by  various 
influences  within  our  own  life,  and  in  the 
w^orld. 

If  faith  is  to  become  a  growing  reality  in  our 
experiences  it  must  fight  in  order  to  maintain 
its  ground.  It  must  maintain  its  position  even 
when  the  whispers  of  unbelief  tell  us  that  our 
failures,  our  depressed  feelings,  and  our  fitful 
moods,  are  greater  facts  than  the  presence  of 
Christ  in  our  lives.  Faith  must  simply  persist 
until  it  conquers  the  suggestions  which 
threaten  to  overthrow  it.  It  dare  not  surrender 
to  mere  inclination. 

We  sometimes  hear  a  man  say :  "  I  have  no 
desire  to  exercise  faith  in  Christ."  But  we 
answer  that  faith  should  be  urged  on  by  the 
will  even  when  desire  fails  to  inspire  it.  There 
is  no  need  for  us  to  wait  for  desire  before  faith 
becomes  energetic.    We  do  not  wait  for  desire 


What  Binds  Us  to  Christ?        63 

in  other  directions  of  life.  If  we  waited  for 
desire  before  we  took  up  our  studies,  our  edu- 
cation would  be  in  jeopardy.  If  we  postponed 
physical  exercise  till  we  were  in  the  mood  for 
it  we  would  experience  serious  consequences. 
And  faith  in  Christ  must  be  exercised  on  the 
same  principle,  it  must  wrestle  with  the  inclina- 
tions which  draw  us  in  the  opposite  directions, 
until  it  has  vanquished  them.  Many  people  are 
waiting  until  the  longing  comes  upon  them 
before  they  enter  into  relations  with  Christ  by 
faith.  But  such  an  attitude  is  an  utterly  false 
view  of  the  position  of  faith.  It  has  a  right, 
and  a  clear  duty,  to  assert  itself  in  the  face  of 
inclination,  and  to  tame  inclination  into  sub- 
jection. 

And  the  same  is  true  in  the  relation  of  faith 
to  knowledge.  There  are  a  great  many  who 
are  holding  back  the  exercise  of  faith  in  Christ 
until  they  have  a  more  or  less  complete  knowl- 
edge of  Him,  and  of  the  problems  which  gather 
around  Him.  But  those  people  forget  that  the 
venture  of  faith  is  the  inspiration  of  knowl- 
edge. Knowledge  grows  through  action. 
While  it  is  possible  on  the  other  hand  to  be  ever 
learning,  and  never  come  to  a  knowledge  of 
the  truth.  Christopher  Columbus  knew  noth- 
ing about  the  New  World  before  he  crossed 


64     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

the  Atlantic.  His  faith  had  to  fight  on  through 
mutiny,  storm,  distance,  and  the  lack  of  definite 
knowledge  as  to  where  he  was  going.  But  the 
heroic  energy  of  a  great  faith  brought  floods 
of  knowledge  to  his  own  mind  and  to  all  the 
world.  And  in  the  same  manner  the  bold  ven- 
ture of  faith  impelled  on  its  way  by  a  coura- 
geous will  is  the  true  attitude  towards  Christ. 
And  a  knowledge  of  Christ  will  come  to  us  as 
we  maintain  that  attitude,  which  can  never 
come  to  us  in  any  other  way. 


yii 

HOW   DOES    OUR    FAITH    EXPRESS    ITSELF 

TOWARDS  GOD? 

PRAYER  is  the  means  by  which  the  in- 
stinct of  faith  expresses  itself  towards 
God  through  Christ.  Prayer  is  the 
activity  of  faith,  it  is  faith  articulated.  It  is 
faith  making  connections.  So  that  prayer  is 
simply  the  continuation  of  the  faith  instinct 
of  relationship.  It  is  like  the  ivy  clinging  by 
its  tendrils  to  the  wall.  It  is  like  the  bee  gath- 
ering honey.  It  is  the  manifestation  of  an 
instinct  which  may  be  aided  and  guided  from 
within  the  life  by  the  Spirit  of  God,  in  seeking 
its  true  spiritual  environment,  as  we  are  willing 
to  let  the  Divine  spirit  help  us.  Of  course,  this 
instinct,  like  every  other,  may  be  developed,  or 
it  may  be  perverted  as  we  encourage,  or  defeat 
it,  as  we  satisfy,  or  starve  it.  Every  instinct 
has  natural  difficulties  to  overcome  in  seeking 
to  reach  its  goal.  The  swallow  seeking  the 
summer  climate  must  press  through   storms 

65 


66     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

on  its  way.  The  child  encounters  difficulties 
in  learning  to  speak. 

And  prayer  must  conquer  physical,  mental 
and  moral  difficulties  in  its  effort  to  express 
itself  in  the  presence  of  our  Lord.  Prayer  is 
therefore  not  an  attempt  to  bring  the  power 
and  presence  of  God  in  Christ  down  out  of  the 
natural  order  of  the  spiritual  world  into  our 
mere  arbitrary  desires.  It  is  quite  the  oppo- 
site, it  is  the  effort  of  our  lives  to  rise  into  the 
natural  order  of  the  spiritual  world.  Prayer 
is  the  lifting  of  our  lives  into  normal  relations 
with  God.  And  in  the  process  of  rising  into 
the  mind  of  Christ  through  prayer  some  desires 
will  perish,  while  others  will  be  intensified.  So 
that  in  the  true  order  of  prayer  the  first  ele- 
ment in  it  is  personal  adjustment  through  con- 
fession. It  is  the  acceptance  of  Divine  for- 
giveness, by  which  we  are  thus  brought  up  into 
the  normal  order  of  the  spiritual  world.  But 
having  been  forgiven,  having  entered  into  nor- 
mal relations  with  God,  the  supreme  attitude 
of  the  soul  in  prayer  is  not  asking  things.  It 
is  the  attempt  to  escape  from  self. 

The  highest  element  in  prayer  consists  in 
freedom  from  all  self-consciousness,  as  we 
adore,  worship,  contemplate,  the  character  of 
God  as  revealed  in  Christ.    The  great  changes 


How  Does  Faith  Express  Itself?     67 

come  in  our  character  while  we  are  in  the  atti- 
tude of  worship.  For  Christian  character  is 
largely  a  by-product  of  worship  and  obedience, 
rather  than  through  direct  requests.  Of  course, 
requests  for  personal  blessings  have  their  place. 
But  they  have  by  no  means  the  supreme  place 
in  the  normal  order  of  the  spiritual  life.  Ex- 
perience teaches  us  that  it  is  quite  possible  to 
be  self-centred  in  our  praying,  as  in  other 
things.  And  some  earnest  people  continually 
thinking  of  their  own  souls,  and  their  own 
needs,  only  succeed  in  becoming  more  and  more 
self-conscious.  And  simply  because  they  have 
followed  a  false  order  in  their  prayer  life. 

Many  would  enter  upon  a  new  day  of  spirit- 
ual experience,  a  new  sense  of  freedom,  of 
expansion,  of  joy,  if  they  began  the  day  by 
quietly  contemplating  God  in  Christ.  For  the 
time  being,  at  least,  forgetting  all  about  their 
good,  bad,  or  indifferent  selves.  Worship  is 
the  highest  attitude  of  the  soul  in  its  relation 
to  God.  And  as  a  consequence  of  worship 
thanksgiving  would  follow  naturally  as  the 
next  instinctive  utterance  of  the  soul  in  its 
prayer  life.  For  it  is  impossible  for  us  to  wor- 
ship without  being  possessed  by  a  sense  of  the 
Divine  goodness.  And  in  the  recollection  of 
the  goodness  of  God  there   inevitably  takes 


68     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

possession  of  us  the  spirit  of  contentment  and 
joy.  One  can  easily  see  this  to  be  the  psycho- 
logical sequel.  And  that  being  so,  an  expan- 
sion, and  enriching,  of  the  inner  life  thereby 
takes  place. 

And  no  one  can  healthily  experience  a  sense 
of  the  goodness  of  God,  and  of  the  content- 
ment and  joy  which  spring  from  it,  without 
longing  to  have  others  share  it.  So  that  inter- 
cession follows  with  perfect  naturalness.  We 
become  conscious  that  we  belong  to  a  large 
human  family  and  we  begin  to  realise  that  it 
is  the  Divine  way  to  give  the  individual  his 
spiritual  growth  as  he  seeks  to  carry  the  world 
Christward  with  him.  When  we  are  able  to 
forget  ourselves  and  identify  ourselves  with 
the  longing,  the  groping,  the  ignorance,  and 
the  failure  of  others  by  intercession  in  the 
presence  of  God,  and  offer  our  personality  as 
a  channel  through  which  God  may  minister  to 
others,  it  is  in  such  attitude  that  we  receive  the 
largest  expansion  of  our  souls. 

Just  as  the  attuned  wireless  instrument 
becomes  the  ipeans  of  communicating  a  mes- 
sage, so  may  the  attuned  soul  become  a  channel 
by  which  God  conveys  blessings  to  other  lives. 
It  may  still  be  a  mystery  how  this  is  done, 
how   intercession    for   human   souls   achieves 


How  Does  Faith  Express  Itself?     69 

results  in  the  spiritual  world,  but  the  important 
thing  to  remember  is  that  it  is  those  who  most 
deeply  engage  in  intercession,  who  are  most 
conscious  of  the  effectiveness  of  it.  In  fact 
this  is  true  in  the  whole  range  of  prayer. 
Arguments  for  the  reasonableness  of  prayer 
are  not  nearly  so  convincing  as  the  conscious- 
ness of  the  reasonableness  of  prayer  which 
springs  from  the  practice  of  prayer.  Indeed, 
it  may  be  said  that  it  is  the  persistent  habit  of 
prayer,  and  what  flows  from  the  habit,  which 
are  the  supreme  arguments  for  prayer.  When 
we  give  the  first  place  in  our  prayer  life  to 
worship,  thanksgiving  and  intercession,  it  will 
then  be  evident  that  many  of  the  things  to 
which  we  had  formerly  given  the  first  place 
will  be  received  by  us  without  asking.  For  our 
richest  spiritual  blessings  come  to  us  by  in- 
direction. 

It  is  a  law  in  the  spiritual  world  that  we 
receive  most  bountifully  when  we  are  most 
completely  captured  by  thoughts  of  the  charac- 
ter of  God,  and  by  the  needs  of  our  fel- 
low men.  Prayer  is  the  outgoing  of  the  whole 
life  towards  God,  just  as  faith  is  the  expres- 
sion of  the  whole  man. 

And  consequently  prayer  involves  the 
human  body.     True  prayer  implies  the  con- 


70     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

quering  of  all  physical  moods.     Jesus  tamed 
the  moods   of   His   body,   its   depression,   its 
weariness,  so  that  it  became  perfectly  obedi- 
ent to  the  demands  of  the  inner  life  in  the  exer- 
cise of  prayer.    It  is  weak  surrender  to  bodily 
inclination  which  is  sometimes  the  cause  of 
the  neglect  of  the  prayer  habit.     And  if  that 
habit  is  to  have  its  true  place,  there  are  many 
who  must  battle  with  their  physical  moods. 
And  this  might  afford  some  an  opportunity  to 
practice  very  real  heroism.     For  there  is  an 
appeal  to  the  heroic  even  in  the  physical  aspect 
of  prayer,  if  the  exercise  is  to  be  charged  with 
reality  rising  above  a  mere  perfunctory  form. 
There   is    far  too   much   pandering  to   the 
whims  of  the  body  in  connection  with  prayer. 
If  some  of  the  physical  endurance  necessary 
for  a   football  match,   or  a  boat  race,   were 
translated    into   the   exercise   of   intercessory 
prayer  great  things  might  come  to  pass.     It 
is  the  triumph  of  sheer  will  power  that  some- 
times keeps  a  man  at  his  oar.     Is  the  same 
effort  as  often  translated  into  prayer? 

True  prayer  demands  mental  concentration. 
It  requires  that  the  mind  shall  steadily  see 
what  it  is  praying  for,  that  it  is  not  merely 
using  a  confused  heap  of  ideas  and  translating 
them  into  words.    It  might  be  a  mental  aid  for 


How  Does  Faith  Express  Itself?     71 

some  of  us  to  write  down  what  is  to  engage 
the  mind  while  at  prayer.  But  that  is  not 
enough.  There  must  be  a  persistent  exercise 
of  the  will  to  keep  merely  curious,  irrelevant 
thoughts  out  of  the  mind  while  engaged  in 
prayer.  For  there  is  continually  a  troop  of 
unimportant,  unnecessary,  or  foolish,  thoughts 
seeking  to  claim  the  place  occupied  by  the 
supreme  ideas  which  should  be  in  possession 
of  our  attention. 

To  surrender  to  the  suggestions  of  unim- 
portant, invading,  thoughts  is  weakness.  Be- 
cause such  surrender  means  the  bisecting  of 
thought,  and  that  is  the  psychological  basis  of 
all  inner  weakness.  And  no  amount  of  Bible 
reading  or  prolonged  periods  of  the  form  of 
prayer  can  make  up  for  a  mind  divided  in  its 
attention  through  a  slack  will.  Mental  con- 
centration means  the  exercise  of  the  will.  And 
when  it  is  secured  it  provides  the  psychological 
basis  of  inner  strength.  All  real  inner  power 
must  spring  from  a  concentrated  mind  secured 
by  the  energy  of  the  will. 

Of  course,  the  will  may  be  greatly  aided  in 
the  securing  of  mental  concentration  in  prayer 
by  faith  working  through  imagination  to  make 
the  presence  of  God  a  reality.  For  true  prayer 
demands  the  exercise  of  faith,  faith  being  the 


72     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

soul  of  prayer.  Prayer  is  prayer  only  as  faith 
is  in  it.  And  the  prayer  of  faith  makes 
Christ  a  near  and  present  reahty.  It  fights 
against  every  whisper  in  the  soul  that 
would  deny  it,  it  wrestles  with  every- 
thing that  would  suggest  its  impotence.  Faith 
conquers  in  prayer  by  keeping  the  imagination 
fixed  upon  the  transcendent,  spiritual  power 
working  in  co-operation  with  it.  The  prayer 
of  faith  shuts  out  all  invasions  that  threaten  to 
weaken  its  bold  venture.  That  is  the  fight  of 
faith.  !Aiid  it  does  its  work  through  imagina- 
tion. And  thus  imagination  is  able  to  aid 
the  will,  and  the  acquired  strength  of  the  will 
reacts  on  the  imagination,  in  the  achievement 
of  victory.  For  every  real  triumph  must  first 
take  place  in  the  soul  before  it  is  actualised  in 
the  world.  Faith  must  visualise  success  before 
it  is  achieved  in  the  actual  battlefield  of  life. 
The  prayer  of  faith  overcomes  the  world  in 
inner  spiritual  conflict,  and  then  summons  all 
the  powers  of  the  being  to  go  out  to  claim  the 
victory  among  the  cold,  hard,  facts  of  the 
world. 


VIII 
WHAT  DOES  CHRIST  DO  FOR  OUR  LIVES? 

CHRIST  is  not  an  arbitrary  imposition 
upon  human  nature.  He  is  not  a 
mortgage  upon  our  already  burdened 
lives.  He  has  come  to  lift  the  mortgage  from 
life,  to  endow  it  with  power.  Christ  is  the 
response  which  Divine, love  has  made  to  the 
problems  which  we  actually  encounter  in  our 
attempt  to  realise  the  chief  end  of  our  exist- 
ence. We  greatly  need  to  keep  this  steadily 
before  our  minds,  because  some  have  turned 
from  Christianity  thinking  it  to  be  another 
heavy  load  flung  upon  lives  already  staggering 
under  burdens. 

But  such  a  view  is  a  false  understanding  of 
the  mission  of  Christ.  Our  Lord  has  come 
in  order  to  make  life  liveable,  to  make  it  rea- 
sonable, to  make  it  possible  for  us  to  attain 
to  our  own  true  moral  and  spiritual  stature. 

If  there  had  been  no  deep  need  in  our  lives 
there  would  have  been  no  revelation  of  Christ. 

73 


74     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

"  God  so  loved  the  world  that  He  gave  His 
only  begotten  Son."    In  all  our  interpretations 
of  Christ  Divine  love  must  be  the  essence  of 
them.     Christ  is  in  our  midst  to  give  us  a 
knowledge  of  the  character  and  attitude  of 
God  towards  us,  which  shall  be  sufficient  for 
the  deepest  needs  of  the  best  and  the  worst 
people  in  the  world.     The  first  thing  which 
very  many  lives  consciously  require  to  know  is 
whether     there     is     forgiveness     with     God. 
Before  they  can  face  the  question  of  a  fresh 
start,  of  moral  progress,  they  are  desperately 
anxious  to  know  whether  there  is  pardon  for 
past  transgression.    For  it  is  only  in  the  sense 
of  forgiveness  that  they  can  ever  hope  to  rise 
into  glad  and  hopeful  moral  enterprise.     If 
they  must  drag  with  them  all  the  sense  of  fail- 
ure and  of  guilt  which  pursues  them  from  the 
past,  into  the  problems  which  await  them  in  the 
present  and   future,  then  they  are  convinced 
that  real  progress  is  impossible.    And  they  are 
surely  right.     The  past  must  be  dealt  with,  if 
there  is  to  be  hope  for  the  future. 

The  problem  of  forgiveness  for  past  sins  is 
part  of  the  problem  of  moral  progress.  And 
it  is  the  first  part  of  moral  progress,  the  most 
urgent  part,  in  multitudes  of  lives.  And  Christ 
has  come  to  reveal,  in  time,  the  attitude  of  the 


What  Does  Christ  Do  for  Us?      75 

heart  of  God,  to  all  who  seek  emancipation 
from  the  tyranny  of  the  past,  in  order  to 
become  what  God  meant  them  to  be  in  the 
present  and  in  the  future.  He  has  come  in 
God's  name  to  absolve  oppressed  souls,  to 
make  the  new  beginning  gloriously  possible. 

In  His  own  personality  Christ  reveals  the 
holiness  and  mercy  of  God.  It  is  not  a  mere 
good-natured  message  of  pardon  which  He 
gives.  The  forgiveness  which  He  offers 
springs  from  the  depths  of  the  holiness  of 
God. 

It  is  easy  enough  for  a  morally  shallow 
parent  to  good-naturedly  forgive  the  serious 
wrong  done  by  his  child,  without  in  any  way 
feeling  the  pang  of  the  wrong  in  his  own 
being.  And  such  shallow  forgiveness  works  a 
double  evil  in  the  life  of  the  child,  it  gives  him 
a  sense  of  the  weak  moral  nature  of  his  parent, 
and  a  feeble  sense  of  the  horror  of  sin.  It  is 
only  when  forgiveness  springs  from  the  depths 
of  a  parent's  moral  nature,  when  forgiveness 
bears  the  marks  of  love  that  is  born  of  holi- 
ness, and  consequently  is  distressed  because  of 
the  fact  of  sin,  it  is  only  then  that  forgiveness 
has  a  redeeming  influence  upon  a  child's  life. 
It  is  then  that  a  child  sees  there  is  self- 
sacrifice  in  a  parent's   forgiveness.     He  sees 


76     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

the  depths  of  the  moral  nature  of  his  parent, 
and  also  he  sees  the  exceeding  sinfuhiess  of  sin. 

This  is  the  vision  which  Christ  gives  of  the 
heart  of  God  in  the  attitude  of  forgiving  sinful 
men.  He  not  only  reveals  the  infinite  love  of 
God  but  the  essential  holiness  of  God.  And 
when  love  and  holiness,  which  are  one,  forgive 
sin,  by  their  very  nature  they  suffer.  Christ 
is  the  revelation,  in  time,  of  the  self-sacrifice 
of  a  holy,  loving  God  in  the  attitude  of  forgiv- 
ing sin.  And  we  are  conscious  in  our  souls  of 
the  fact  of  forgiveness,  and  also  of  the  love  and 
holiness  from  which  the  forgiveness  springs. 
The  consciousness  of  this  is  as  real  in  the 
experience  of  people  all  about  us,  as  their  sense 
of  the  outer  world.  They  live,  and  they  are 
ready  to  die,  in  the  firm  assurance  of  it. 

It  is  Christ's  message  of  forgiveness  which 
has  given  us  our  fresh  start,  as  it  gave  Saul  of 
Tarsus  and  the  redeemed  in  all  ages,  their 
new  moral  enthusiasm.  And  the  fact  of  our 
forgiveness  is  as  vivid  to  us  as  any  other  fact  in 
our  existence.  The  most  tangible  realities  have 
their  explanation  in  our  sense  of  forgiveness — 
our  joy,  our  zest  in  life,  our  passion  for  moral 
progress.  Without  our  sense  of  forgiveness, 
our  life  would  be  like  a  garden  of  flowers 
which  had  been  frost  bitten. 


What  Does  Christ  Do  for  Us?      77 

There  are  very  many  whose  immediate 
sense  of  need  is  not  so  much  the  need  of  for- 
giveness as  an  inteUigible  interpretation  of 
God  for  which  their  minds  have  been  instinct- 
ively searching.  And  it  is  a  matter  of  actual 
experience  that  Christ  has  given  them  the 
answer.  They  are  prepared  to  testify  that 
their  minds  are  satisfied  with  the  vision  of  God 
which  Christ  has  given.  They  are  content  to 
let  Christ  be  their  point  of  contact  with  all  that 
is  in  the  unseen  world.  Christ  has  gathered 
up  the  broken  revelations  of  God  made  by 
prophets  and  sages  and  poets,  and  has  unified 
them  in  His  own  personality. 

It  may  be  our  own  experience  that  we  were 
bewildered  by  the  vast  realms  of  truth 
which  we  had  neither  time  nor  the  ability  to 
explore,  and  we  observed  that  those  who  had 
given  up  their  lives  to  speculative  enquiry  in 
those  realms  have  in  many  instances  reached 
no  satisfying  conclusions.  There  was  there- 
fore no  encouragement  for  us  to  find  intel- 
lectual peace  in  that  direction.  But  through 
contact  with  Christ  we  found  mental  satisfac- 
tion. We  become  intellectually  reconciled  to 
the  situation,  in  the  seen  and  in  the  unseen 
worlds,  because  of  the  light  which  He  has  shed. 
Christ  gave  us  a  working  contact  with  the 


78     Religion  and  the  Growing  JVIind 

universe.    He  brought  God  within  the  scope  of 
our  intelligence.     He  simplified  ideas  of  God 
to  the  range  of  our  capacity.     And  the  result 
is  that  we  are  not  paralysed  by  mystery,  or 
vastness.     We  find  ourselves  at  home  in  the 
midst    of    the    immensity    which    astronomy 
reveals,  and  of  the  antiquity  of  the  world  pro- 
claimed by  geology.     Our  minds  stayed  upon 
Christ,  we  are  at  peace,  and  it  is  not  a  passive 
peace  either,  but  a  peace  flowing  from  a  posi- 
tive, vital,  contact  with  the  seen  and  the  unseen 
worlds.     And  we  know  this  to  be  true,  our 
experience  in  the  matter  is  of  the  very  essence 
of  reality.     And  it  is  the  revelation  of  Christ 
which  has  made  it  possible. 

There  are  many  who  are  not  greatly  troubled 
by  the  intellectual  outlook  but  they  are  per- 
plexed as  to  how  they  are  to  become  sharers 
in  the  power  that  is  necessary  in  order  to  live 
the  highest  kind  of  life.  They  are  conscious 
that  there  is  Divine  power  available,  but  the 
problem  is  to  establish  a  point  of  contact  with 
it  for  the  practical  purposes  of  life.  Just  as 
engineers  long  saw  that  there  was  power  in 
the  current  of  Niagara  which  might  be  trans- 
formed into  electricity  to  drive  machinery,  and 
illumine  cities.  But  the  engineering  problem 
was  to  make  the  power  in  Niagara  available. 


What  Does  Christ  Do  for  Us?      79 

to  obtain  it  in  a  workable  form,  and  to  trans- 
mit it  to  the  point  of  need.  That  problem  has 
been  solved,  the  power  houses  on  the  banks  of 
Niagara  transform  the  energy  in  the  river  cur- 
rent into  light,  heat  and  power  to  minister  to 
human  need  in  distant  cities.  And  Christ  has 
gathered  the  power  of  God  into  Himself  for 
transmission  to  the  point  of  human  need.  He 
has  become  a  power  house,  as  it  were,  for  the 
bringing  of  the  energy  of  God  into  an 
approachable,  practical,  relation  to  the  moral 
needs  of  men.  He  has  become  the  point  of 
contact  with  that  energy  which  God  has  to 
bestow  for  the  necessities  of  human  life. 

Without  Christ  the  power  of  God  is  a  vague, 
intangible,  unapproachable,  reality.  With  a 
sense  of  awe,  we  see  Divine  power  at  work 
in  holding  the  speeding  worlds  in  their  courses. 
We  think  of  it  as  present  In  the  glowing  galaxy 
of  suns,  in  the  renewal  of  nature  upon  our  own 
planet.  But  how  shall  we  come  into  contact 
with  that  power  for  the  renewal  of  our  stag- 
gering lives?  How  shall  the  exhausted  ener- 
gies of  our  being  be  replenished  for  the  tasks 
of  our  existence?  That  is  our  practical  ques- 
tion. And  Christ  is  God's  practical  answer. 
Christ  is  the  power  of  God.  And  it  has  be- 
come a  working  fact  in  our  lives  up  to  the 


80    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

measure  of  the  reality  of  our  vital  contact 
with  Christ.  And  it  is  the  testimony  of  multi- 
tudes that  the  power  of  Christ  has  broken  the 
tyranny  of  evil  habit  in  their  lives.  It  has 
renewed  the  exhausted,  the  weak,  the  diseased, 
will.  It  has  endowed  character  with  moral 
capital  so  that  bankrupt  lives  have  gone  back 
into  life  with  the  zest  of  a  fresh  start.  And 
this  is  just  as  true  in  spiritual  experience  as 
it  is  true  in  another  sense  in  the  world  of  busi- 
ness where  men  of  large  financial  resources 
carry  on  gigantic  enterprises.  A  great  nation 
like  the  United  States  can  carry  out  the  task 
of  making  a  Panama  canal,  because  the  na- 
tional treasury  is  behind  all  the  patience,  skill, 
and  courage. 

And  so  the  power  of  God  is  in  Christ  to  be 
drawn  upon  for  the  small  and  the  large  moral 
enterprises  before  us  all.  Christ  has  thus  be- 
come to  us  our  point  of  contact  with  Divine 
forgiveness,  enlightenment,  and  power.  And 
these  have  become  practical  realities  in  the 
living  of  life.  The  feelings  may  be  all  the 
other  way.  One^s  mood  may  be  so  depressed 
and  antagonistic  to  the  will  as  to  almost  indi- 
cate the  paralysis  of  the  will.  But  Christ 
informs  the  will  that  it  is  not  only  pos- 
sible for  it  to  act  in  the  most  adverse  circum- 


What  Does  Christ  Do  for  Us?      81 

stances,  but  that  it  is  absolutely  imperative  to 
do  so.  The  will  dare  not  surrender  to  anything 
except  to  light  upon  the  road  of  life.  Any 
lower  surrender  defeats  the  end  Christ  has  in 
view  as  He  co-operates  with  us  in  the  making 
of  personality.  And  personality  can  never  be 
developed  except  as  the  will  recognises  both 
its  power  and  its  duty  to  maintain  the  su- 
premacy. Imagination  may  be  a  powerful 
inspiration,  or  hindrance  to  the  will.  It  may 
be  its  very  greatest  ally. 

And  that  has  always  been  the  intention  of 
Christ.  He  always  has  insisted,  that  the  imag- 
ination shall  not  be  permitted  to  handicap  the 
will.  The  will  shall  not  move  in  one  direction 
and  the  imagination  in  another.  Christ  in- 
spires the  imagination  to  paint  hopefully  the 
picture  of  the  future,  He  insists  that  the  imag- 
ination shall  look  out  with  concentration  upon 
every  situation,  with  that  hopefulness  which 
takes  into  account  the  Divine  power,  presence, 
and  providence. 

When  Christ  urged  men  not  to  be  anxious 
about  the  morrow,  it  was  not  in  order  to 
weaken  devotion  to  the  practical  tasks  of  life, 
but  in  order  to  have  imagination  undivided 
and  consecrated  to  the  problems  which  the  will 
has  actually  to  undertake.     Christ  was  con- 


82     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

tiniially  busy  upon  the  human  imagination, 
inspiring  it,  so  that  it  should  become  a  strong 
ally  of  the  will  in  the  doing  of  the  Divine  will. 
It  is  when  imagination  becomes  a  co-worker 
with  thought  under  the  direction  of  the  will 
and  all  of  them  inspired  by  Christ,  that  the 
elemental  life  within  is  stirred.  It  is  in  the 
elemental  depths  of  being  that  we  reach  the 
heroic  zone,  it  is  there  that  heroisms  are 
born.  It  is  there  that  life  is  unified,  so  that 
its  various  parts  like  the  various  parts  of  a 
locomotive  unified  by  the  driving  power  of 
steam,  become  possessed  by  the  dominating 
passion  of  doing  the  will  of  Christ.  And  in 
that  attitude  a  Christian  personality  becomes  a 
growing  reality  which  is  the  greatest  thing  on 
this  planet,  finding  itself  in  what  we  call  time 
and  eternity  at  the  same  moment,  the  facts 
of  time  and  eternity  acting  upon  it  while  per- 
sonality assimilates  both  in  the  expansion  of  its 
ageless  life. 


IX 


OBEDIENCE  TO  THE  WILL  OF  CHRIST 

OBEDIENCE  to  Christ  is  the  outward 
expression  of  the  reaHty  of  faith  and 
prayer.  It  is  the  counterpart  of  the 
inner  life. 

Our  Master  has  a  universal  programme  to 
unfold,  to  incarnate,  in  human  society.  And 
He  has  His  programme  in  His  own  hands. 
He  alone  can  direct  His  vast  campaign.  For 
His  purposes  stretch  from  individual  lives  to 
the  universal,  and  through  all  time.  Such  a 
programme  is  too  immense  for  any  other  than 
Himself  to  administer.  And  in  the  adminis- 
tration of  His  world  purpose  He  is  seeking  for 
those  who  will  surrender  themselves  to  Him, 
so  that  they  shall  become  the  instruments  in 
the  achievement  of  His  plans. 

Thus  it  becomes  clear  that  the  first  step 
towards  our  co-operation  with  Christ  in  the 
bringing  in  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  upon  earth 
is  not  merely  by  our  doing  some  good  in  the 

83 


84     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

world,  but  in  surrendering  ourselves  to  Him, 
to  do  the  good  He  would  have  us  do. 

It  is  only  in  this  way  that  there  can  be  any 
approximation  to  the  carrying  out  of  a  plan 
that  shall  have  unity  of  design  in  it.  It  is  only 
through  genuine  surrender  to  Christ  that  His 
true  programme  can  be  unfolded,  that  a  large, 
universal  idea  can  sway  the  whole  of  Christian 
activity,  it  is  only  in  this  way  that  mere  indi- 
vidual hobbies,  and  prejudices,  can  be  con- 
quered, and  subdued,  into  one  dominating  pur- 
pose, plan,  and  spirit.  Therefore  we  say  that 
surrender  to  Christ  is  the  point  of  contact 
between  Christ  and  our  souls,  if  we  are  to  have 
some  intelligent  share  in  the  coming  of  the 
Kingdom  of  God  in  this  world,  if  we  are  to  be 
something,  and  do  something,  that  shall  be  in 
harmony  with  the  spirit  and  the  activity  of  all 
those  who  are  true  disciples  of  Christ. 

For,  after  all,  what  this  world  needs  is  not 
only  people  who  will  do  things,  but  who  will 
do  things  without  overlapping,  and  confusion, 
things  that  are  of  primary  importance,  which, 
when  done,  will  make  it  unnecessary  that  other 
secondary  things  should  be  done,  and  that  what 
is  done  shall  be  done  in  the  right  spirit.  And 
surrender  to  Christ,  to  the  spirit  and  purpose 
of  the  living  Christ,  means  to  move  in  this 


Obedience  to  the  Will  of  Christ     85 

direction.  But  this  word  surrender  has  been 
worn  thin.  It  has  been  given  a  very  narrow 
meaning  by  some,  it  has  been  interpreted  to 
mean  giving  up  a  few  things  which  have  been 
disapproved  by  the  Christian  social  conscience. 
But  it  has  a  much  more  profound  meaning  than 
that.  Surrender  to  Christ  implies  giving  up  the 
life  to  His  purpose,  rather  than  to  try  to  use 
His  power  for  our  small,  and  local  ambitions. 

When  Abraham  Lincoln  said  he  was  not 
anxious  to  have  God  on  his  side,  but  he  was 
greatly  concerned  to  be  on  God's  side,  he 
declared  the  principle  for  which  we  are  here 
contending.  Surrender  to  Christ  means  to  let 
His  Spirit  control  us,  to  be  willing  to  be  led  by 
Him,  rather  than  by  our  ambitions.  And  in 
order  to  make  surrender  a  really  strong  and 
vital  fact  in  experience,  the  summoning  of  the 
whole  being  will  be  necessary.  Mere  earnest- 
ness is  not  enough,  it  is  an  appeal  for  the  exer- 
cise of  hard  thinking,  and  of  a  will  that  wills 
to  translate  the  mind  of  Christ  into  conduct. 

While  we  are  in  the  attitude  of  surrender, 
Christ  becomes  responsible  for  the  development 
of  our  spiritual  life.  There  are  some  people 
who,  in  their  earnestness,  worry  a  great  deal 
concerning  their  spiritual  growth.  They  are 
continually   consulting   their    feelings   to    see 


86     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

whether  they  are  just  as  spiritual,  and  just  as 
happy,  as  they  were  on  some  previous  conspic- 
uous occasion,  and  if  they  are  not  quite  up  to 
the  mark  they  are  more  or  less  distressed. 
Now  we  do  not  here  criticise  the  motive  in  this 
performance,  but  we  certainly  condemn  the 
method.  For  instead  of  helping  the  soul  it 
discourages  it,  and  it  makes  for  morbid  self- 
consciousness,  and  it  identifies  religion  with 
emotionalism. 

Our  spiritual  development  is  far  too  impor- 
tant a  matter  to  be  made  to  rest  upon  the  state 
of  our  feelings,  or  even  to  be  left  in  our  hands. 
Our  business  is  to  fulfill  conditions,  it  is  the 
concern  of  our  Lord  to  see  that  our  spiritual 
development  is  realised.  It  is  not  a  mark  of 
faith  to  worry  over  it,  it  is  rather  a  mark  of 
sheer  unbelief.  And  if  we  maintain  the  atti- 
tude of  surrender  our  Master  will  take  care  of 
our  influence.  Influence  is  a  by-product  of 
fidelity.  Genuine  influence  must  always  come 
by  indirection.  And  it  is  because  some  good 
people  fail  to  see  tfiis,  that  they  keep  awake  at 
night  thinking  how  they  can  make  their  influ- 
ence more  secure.  And  they  consequently  try 
too  hard  to  make  an  impression  upon  others, 
and  others  detect  the  artificial  element.  For  it 
becomes    oppressive,    self-conscious,    strained 


Obedience  to  the  Will  of  Christ     87 

piety.  And  instead  of  exerting  an  influence, 
they  have  no  influence  simply  because  they 
took  the  matter  into  their  own  hands,  instead 
of  leaving  it  absolutely  with  their  Master. 
And  the  pity  of  it  all  is  that  the  motive  may 
have  been  high,  but  the  method  hopelessly 
wrong. 

If  we  are  surrendered  to  the  spirit  and  will 
of  Christ,  He  will  certainly  preserve  our  influ- 
ence against  any  ungenerous  attitude  of  the 
world.  But  we  must  trust  Him  in  the  matter, 
for  we  may  see  no  signs  of  such  preservation. 
For  the  time  being  it  may  seem  to  be  all  the 
other  way,  and  simple  faith  will  be  the  only 
thing  to  keep  us  from  panic.  It  is  in  this  way 
we  enter  into  freedom  from  bondage  to  self- 
consciousness,  from  the  paralysing  grasp  of 
fears  which  contract  personality  into  withered 
smallness. 

We  find  our  true  life,  our  natural  spiritual 
expansion,  as  we  maintain  a  healthy  self- 
forget  fulness  in  the  attitude  of  companionship 
with  Christ.  And  this  attitude  is  maintained 
through  the  habitual  exercise  of  the  prayer  of 
faith  on  the  one  hand,,  and  instant  obedience 
on  the  other.  For  obedience  is  the  energetic 
sequel  to  the  prayer  of  faith.  They  are  two 
parts  of  one  vital  whole.     And  they  act  and 


88     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

react  upon  each  other.  And  it  is  as  we  thus 
live  in  the  companionship  of  the  actual  pres- 
ence of  our  Lord  that  we  become  partakers  of 
the  forgiveness  of  God.  And  the  depths  of 
our  nature  are  satisfied. ^  What  the  world  had 
absolutely  failed  to  do  for  us  in  the  direction 
of  giving  inner  satisfaction  and  rest  takes  place 
as  a  result  of  fellowship  with  Christ.  And  in 
so  far  as  we  are  able  to  maintain  implicit  trust 
in  the  actual  presence  of  Christ,  we  are  able  to 
live  above  discouragement.  For  discourage- 
ment arises  when  we  come  to  an  end  of  our 
inner  resources. 

Discouragement  is  inner  bankruptcy.  But 
there  is  no  such  thing  if  we  continually  believe 
that  there  is  with  us  a  presence  and  power 
equal  to  all  occasions.  When  we  believe  that 
there  is  actually  behind  us,  and  in  us,  a  pres- 
ence infinitely  greater  than  our  moods  of 
depression,  or  our  sense  of  personal  weakness, 
a  power  which  is  sufificient  for  all  our  tasks  and 
emergencies,  we  have  found  the  antidote 
against  discouragement.  And  not  only  so,  but 
in  the  life  of  companionship  with  Christ  there 
arises  a  sense  of  Divine  providence  over- 
shadowing every  step  of  our  way.  Whatever 
happens  to  us,  as  we  live  in  union  with  our 
Master,  and  His  will,  is  all  right  so  far  as  our 


Obedience  to  the  Will  of  Christ     89 

highest  interests  are  concerned.  What  comes 
to  us  may  be  the  result  of  unreasonableness, 
stupidity,  or  cruelty,  on  the  part  of  others. 
Yet  they  only  succeed  in  making  our  own  lives 
deeper,  more  patient,  more  charitable. 

If  we  were  not  living  in  fellowship  with 
Christ,  with  a  sense  of  an  overruling  provi- 
dence protecting  our  highest  concerns,  the 
same  set  of  circumstances  would  probably  drive 
us  into  bitterness,  impatience,  and  hatred.  We 
see  every  day  the  same  experience  producing 
totally  different  results,  some  are  strengthened 
and  purified,  while  others  are  weakened  and 
made  gross.  The  same  fire  which  melts  wax 
hardens  clay.  The  same  sun  which  ripens  into 
fruit  the  blossoming  branches  of  an  apple  tree, 
causes  a  branch  which  has  been  severed  from 
the  tree  to  wither. 

We  see  therefore  that  Christ  cares  for  our 
spiritual  life  in  the  largest  way  possible,  as  we 
abide  in  His  presence  by  faith,  and  in  the  atti- 
tude of  surrender  to  His  will.  He  cannot  do 
the  best  for  us  except  as  we  forget  ourselves 
in  our  willingness  to  obey  Him  in  the  bringing 
in  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  in  the  world.  We 
cannot  be  spiritually  developed  by  remaining 
in  aloofness  from  the  needs  of  the  world.  We 
cannot  grow  by  losing  sight  of  the  larger  pur- 


90     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

poses  of  Christ,  and  by  being  concerned  only 
for  the  peace  and  happiness  of  our  own  souls. 

Such  a  method  of  spiritual  progress  is  not 
the  method  of  Christ,  and  it  is  not  the  method 
by  which  the  strongest  and  most  virile  types 
of  Christian  character  have  been  produced. 
The  highest  knowledge  comes  to  us  in  doing 
the  will  of  Christ,  and  it  is  not  a  mere  intel- 
lectual knowledge  which  we  lay  upon  the 
shelves  of  our  memory  and  rarely  use,  it  is  a 
knowledge  which  becomes  part  of  the  working 
capital  of  daily  life. 

A  deepening  sense  of  the  presence  of  Christ 
comes  to  us  in  the  way  of  obedience.  And 
the  keenest  sympathy  with  our  fellowmen 
comes  to  us  in  our  attempt  to  serve  them 
according  to  the  Divine  will. 


X 


THE  DANGEROUS  WHISPER  IN  THE  SOUL 

WHEN  the  will  resolves  to  co-operate 
with  the  mind  of  Christ  in  carry- 
ing out  His  purposes  in  and 
through  us  we  become  vividly  conscious  of 
antagonistic  influences,  subtle  whisperings 
within  us  call  us  in  other  directions.  We  be- 
come aware  that  the  spiritual  life  is  haunted 
by  a  false  voice,  by  suggestions  which  if  fol- 
lowed lead  to  confusion,  sorrow,  dishonour.  It 
is  enough  to  know  that  temptation  is  a  great 
reality  of  which  we  are  painfully  conscious. 
We  cannot  get  away  from  the  fact  by  the  dis- 
cussion of  its  mystery.  The  suggestion  which 
the  false  whisper  makes  within  us  is  not  neces- 
sarily grotesque,  outrageous.  It  may  not  be 
the  suggestion  of  an  absolute,  black,  falsehood, 
it  may  simply  be  a  half  truth.  The  tempta- 
tions which  assailed  Jesus  were  half  truths. 
They  were  twisted  quotations  from  Scripture. 
We  are  not  all  tempted  to  maliciously  slan- 

91 


92     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

der  people,  but  we  all  know  what  it  is  to  be 
inclined  to  utter  a  few  mean  spirited  remarks. 
Or  it  may  be  an  ungenerous  silence  to  which 
we  are  tempted  to  succumb,  or  to  a  subtle 
cynical  attitude.  An  observer  would  hardly 
notice  it,  but  it  registers  itself  tipon  our  own 
inner  life.  Of  course,  there  is  no  sin  in  being 
tempted,  temptation  becomes  sin  only  when 
there  is  surrender  to  it.  We  are  not  thieves 
because  a  burglar  tries  to  get  into  our  house. 
And  many  young  people  who  have  sensitive 
consciences  are  sometimes  greatly  distressed, 
beause  they  have  not  made  a  clear  distinction 
between  temptation  as  an  involuntary  sugges- 
tion made  to  the  mind,  and  as  an  overture 
accepted  by  the  will. 

The  fact  of  being  tempted  is  something  for 
which  we  are  not  responsible.  Indeed,  tempta- 
tion plays  an  absolutely  necessary  part  in  our 
moral  progress.  There  can  be  no  real  develop- 
ment, no  moral  refinement,  without  it.  With- 
out temptation  Jesus  would  have  remained 
unsullied  but  immature,  spotless  but  not  strong. 

There  is  no  such  thing  as  Christian  character 
except  as  the  highest  is  chosen  in  the  presence 
of  the  temptation  to  choose  what  is  lower.  The 
greatest  enemy  of  the  highest  is  not  neces- 
sarily the  lowest,  but  the  lower  than  the  high- 


Dangerous  Whisper  in  the  Soul      93 

est.  The  arch  enemy  of  the  best  is  not  the 
worst,  but  the  second  best.  And  a  part  of  the 
subtlety  of  the  temptation  is  that  nobody  seems 
to  keenly  observe  the  difference  between  our 
choice  of  the  highest  as  against  what  is  lower 
than  the  highest.  But  there  is  that  difference 
which  exists  between  chivalry  and  mediocrity. 

And  the  difference  is  always  indicated  upon 
our  own  souls,  however  blind  the  outside  world 
may  be  to  it.  While  we  are  always  haunted 
by  temptation,  there  are  times  when  we  are 
especially  exposed  to  it.  One  of  those  times 
is  after  hard  strain  at  work  or  play.  The  hour 
of  reaction  is  a  dangerous  period,  just  as  after 
a  shot  is  fired  from  a  gun,  it  recoils  upon  the 
shoulder  and  will  blacken  it,  if  one  is  not  pre- 
pared for  the  recoil,  so  must  we  be  prepared 
for  inner  reaction.  Our  greatest  temptations 
may  come  to  us  after  our  most  exalted,  our 
most  spiritual,  experiences.  It  was  so  with 
Jesus.  And  we  must  not  think  that  our  experi- 
ence at  a  communion  service,  or  on  some  other 
hallowed  occasion,  was  spurious  because  it  was 
followed  by  suggestions  that  were  of  a  differ- 
ent order.  The  thing  is  not  surprising  and  it 
is  wisdom  to  be  prepared  for  it. 

The  days  after  a  prolonged  college  exam- 
ination, after  a  convention,  the  hours  after  a 


94     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

day's  hard  work,  these  experiences  call  for 
places  of  refuge  for  the  inner  life  in  the  grip 
of  reaction.  There  must  be  the  provision  of 
some  pure,  healthy  occupation  or  amusement 
in  which  the  relaxed  mind  may  rest,  and  be 
refreshed,  without  being  weakened  or  strained. 

While  temptation  presents  itself  in  a  wide 
variety  of  forms,  we  have  a  comprehensive 
classification  into  three  phases  in  the  tempta- 
tion of  our  Lord,  which  indicate  the  lines  along 
which  the  false  whisper  comes  to  us.  The 
first  phase  is  the  suggestion  to  satisfy  physical 
craving  by  surrendering  the  claims  and  rights 
of  the  soul.  For  example,  we  may  have  had  a 
day  of  exhausting  toil  and  the  body  needs  rest. 
But  the  soul  also  requires  spiritual  contempla- 
tion, communion,  prayer.  Shall  the  mood  of 
the  body  conquer  the  rights  of  the  soul?  Shall 
we  permit  the  interests  of  our  higher  life  to  be 
defeated  by  the  pleadings  of  physical  desire? 
Shall  we  allow  the  will  to  surrender  to  mere 
physical  inclination  simply  because  it  is  easier? 

The  second  phase  of  temptation  as  illus- 
trated by  the  experience  of  Jesus  is  to  trust  to 
the  help  of  God  in  an  act  or  career  of  self-will. 
To  obey  the  whisper  of  the  sinister  voice 
within  and  then  to  say  that  God  will  take  care 
of  us  upon  the  self-chosen  path.    To  cast  our- 


Dangerous  Whisper  in  the  Soul      95 

selves  down  from  the  place  of  duty  to  the 
abyss  of  self-will  and  to  be  deceived  into  think- 
ing that  in  so  doing  God  will  give  His  angels 
charge  concerning  us.  That  is  the  temptation 
which  has  a  firm  grasp  upon  a  man  when  he 
says  that  even  although  he  lives  a  careless  life, 
the  love  of  the  Divine  Father  will  protect  and 
save  him. 

It  is  a  plausible  half  truth,  and  consequently 
a  most  dangerous  error.  The  love  of  the 
Divine  Father  is  a  great  fact,  but  it  can  do 
nothing  for  us  except  as  the  human  will  co- 
operates with  the  Divine  love.  The  redeeming 
love  of  God  makes  it  possible  for  us  all  to  make 
a  fresh  start  in  a  life  of  obedience  to  the  Divine 
will,  but  it  does  not,  and  cannot,  save  us  except 
as  we  rise  to  it  by  definite  choice.  The  love  of 
God  is  not  a  substitute  for  human  character,  it 
is  the  opportunity  which  we  embrace  in  order 
to  achieve  character.  The  love  of  God  cannot 
redeem  a  life  until  that  life  through  the  energy 
of  the  will  co-operates  in  the  redeeming  pro- 
gramme. 

'And  the  third  phase  of  temptation  which 
is  emphasised  by  the  experience  of  Jesus 
is  to  seek  success  by  a  short  path  across  for- 
bidden ground.  Success  is  a  perfectly  legiti- 
mate   ambition    if    it    comes    honestly    and 


96     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

naturally.  But  if  we  obtain  it  by  surrender  to 
what  we  know  to  be  wrong,  even  although  the 
surrender  may  be  ever  so  brief,  we  have  paid 
a  terrible  price  for  what  must  turn  out  to  be  a 
bad  bargain. 

If  one  should  succeed  in  an  examination  by 
surreptitiously  getting  help  from  a  neighbour 
at  the  examination  what  a  miserable  thing  the 
success  must  turn  out  to  be.  If  one  should 
make  a  fortune  by  misrepresenting  a  competi- 
tor the  situation  would  not  be  saved  even  if 
the  whole  fortune  were  given  away  to  philan- 
thropic causes.  The  generous  act  could  not 
wipe  out  the  stain  upon  the  inner  life,  nor  could 
it  atone  for  the  injustice  done  to  the  neighbour. 
The  modern  mind  is  terribly  tempted  by  this 
sinister  suggestion  to  win  success  at  the  price 
of  a  surrender  of  moral  principle,  and  then 
to  make  up  for  the  surrender  by  giving  away 
the  fruits  of  success  to  good  causes.  But  we 
greatly  need  to  revise  our  ideals  of  success. 
There  are  few  things  the  rising  generation  re- 
quire to  keep  more  steadily  before  the  mind 
than  the  fact  that  genuine  success  must  spring 
from  the  inner  life  in  remaining  true  to  the 
spirit  and  mind  of  Christ. 

The  elements  out  of  which  a  satisfying  suc- 
cess is  made  must  include  a  clean  conscience, 


Dangerous  Whisper  in  the  Soul      97 

a  kind  spirit,  a  clear  head,  and  an  iron  will. 
And  if  we  should  find  that  we  cannot  make  a 
great  worldly  success  by  insisting  that  all  of 
these  shall  go  into  our  scheme  of  life,  then  we 
must  simply  follow  our  Master  in  being  content 
with  what  comes.  After  all,  the  man  who  gets 
all  he  desires,  by  the  surrender  of  his  higher 
self,  does  not  really  possess  the  things  he  has 
obtained.  He  must  often  feel  that  the  dead- 
ening of  his  inner  sensibilities  by  being  untrue 
to  them,  has  taken  the  keen  edge  off  his  power 
to  enjoy  what  he  has  gathered  about  him. 
While  the  man  who  retains  the  keen  sensi- 
bility and  the  power  of  enthusiastic  apprecia- 
tion, which  spring  from  keeping  the  native 
pieties  of  the  soul  unsullied,  may  get  far  more 
real  satisfaction  out  of  his  humbler  lot.  Be- 
sides, those  who  are  true  to  their  deepest  selves 
in  their  life,  and  work,  in  this  world  are  doing 
far  more  for  the  solving  of  the  intricate  and 
urgent  social  problems  of  our  time. 

No  amount  of  mere  philanthropy,  or  mere 
mental  brilliance,  which  winks  at  wrong,  can 
make  up  for  simple,  transparent,  conduct,  in 
the  solving  of  the  modern  social  situation. 
Christ  is  seeking  to  bring  in  the  Kingdom  of 
God  upon  earth,  and  He  will  do  it  through 
those  who  are  willing  to  carry  out  His  spirit 


98     Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

and  will  in  life  at  any  cost,  and  in  so  doing,  are 
ready  to  resist  plausible  temptations  to  seek 
success  apart  from  the  Christian  temper.  For 
the  Kingdom  of  God  on  earth  is  simply  the 
spirit  of  Christ,  the  plan,  the  purpose  of  Christ, 
reigning  in  human  society.  And  if  we  are  will- 
ing to  take  our  ideals  from  Christ,  our  spirit, 
and  programme,  from  Him,  and  all  the  conse- 
quences which  may  fall  upon  us  personally  for 
weal  or  woe  as  a  result  of  such  an  attitude, 
then  we  march  with  those  who  shall  yet  bring 
in  a  new  day  of  brotherhood  and  peace  upon 
the  earth. 


XI 


THE  DIVINE  WHISPER  IN  THE  SOUL 

IN  our  attempt  to  translate  the  mind  of 
Christ  into  conduct,  we  have  the  aid  of 
the  spirit  of  God  within  us.  It  is  not 
necessary  for  us  to  ask  Him  to  come  to  us.  He 
has  come  already.  The  human  soul  is  the  cen- 
tral sphere  of  the  overtures  of  the  Divine 
Spirit.  Since  He  is  everywhere  present,  He 
is  supremely  present  within  ourselves.  The 
difference  between  lives  is  that  some  possess 
the  spirit,  while  others  are  possessed  by  the 
spirit,  as  it  may  be  said  of  some  that  they  pos- 
sess ideas,  while  others  are  possessed  by  them. 
And  the  way  by  which  the  spirit  gains  the 
ascendency  within  us  is  through  permitting 
Him  to  get  possession  of  our  next  thought.  It 
is  the  next  thought  that  is  the  highway  along 
which  the  spirit  enters  into  possession  of  our 
growing  personality.  He  waits  for  the  human 
will  to  admit  Him  through  the  concentration 
of  the  mind  upon  what  He  would  have  us 

99 


100    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

think,  and  do.  For  it  is  possible  for  us  to 
attempt  our  part  in  the  programme  of  Christ, 
either  in  our  own  way  or  by  the  help  of  the 
Divine  Spirit.  The  Holy  Spirit  seeks  to  aid 
us  in  carrying  out  the  mind  of  Christ. 

The  Holy  Spirit  within  us  moves  along  cer- 
tain psychological  lines  as  He  seeks  to  co-oper- 
ate with  us  in  the  doing  of  the  will  of  Christ, 
just  as  electricity  must  have  wires  along  which 
it  moves.  And  as  wires  of  certain  metals  are 
better  conductors  of  electricity  than  others,  so 
there  are  certain  attitudes  of  our  inner  life 
which  lend  themselves  most  advantageously  to 
obtaining  the  aid  of  the  power  of  the  Spirit  in 
doing  the  will  of  Christ.  Or  there  are  certain 
attitudes  which  the  Spirit  creates  when  we 
surrender  to  Him. 

As  we  have  already  remarked  mental  con- 
centration is  the  first  psychological  condition 
of  the  Spirit's  co-operation  with  us.  Or  we 
may  say  that  the  Holy  Spirit  helps  us  to  attain 
to  the  concentration  of  the  mind  and  in  this 
He  becomes  the  inspirer  and  educator  of  our 
intellectual  life.  While  at  the  same  time  all 
straining,  all  over-anxiety,  defeats  the  Spirit  in 
His  attempt  to  help  us  to  live  and  act.  We 
mean  by  straining  that  same  temptation  to 
which  the  golfer  is  exposed  when  he  tries  too 


Divine  Whisper  in  the  Soul       101 

hard  to  strike  the  ball,  and  drives  it  only  a 
short  distance.  "  Relax,"  "  Do  not  press," 
these  are  the  expressions  used  by  the  experi- 
enced golfer  to  the  novice.  And  they  apply 
in  every  phase  of  life  as  well  as  in  golf.  Strain 
is  a  non-conductor  of  spiritual  power.  It  is  so 
in  the  matter  of  anxiety  for  influence;  it 
applies  in  speaking;  some  people  even  strain 
too  much  in  listening  to  others,  they  try  too 
hard  to  show  their  interest.  It  is  a  habit  which 
has  become  chronic  in  some  instances,  for  even 
while  sitting  still  there  is  no  mental  attitude  of 
repose,  there  is  an  unnecessary  expenditure  of 
psychic  force  which  causes  physical  exhaustion. 

It  is  this  habit  of  straining  which  is  a  fre- 
quent cause  of  nervous  prostration,  and  it  may 
take  place  in  lives  which  have  not  a  great  deal 
of  work  to  do.  We  may  strain  over  anything, 
we  may  expend,  as  it  were,  the  energy  neces- 
sary to  cut  down  a  tree  in  the  act  of  driving 
a  nail.  And  in  trying  too  hard  we  shut  off 
the  real  power  which  should  find  expression 
in  our  lives.  It  is  like  applying  the  brakes  on 
a  train  while  the  steam  is  full  on,  which  means 
the  expenditure  of  power  in  opposite  directions 
and  the  result  is  not  only  friction  but  enor- 
mous tear  and  wear. 

If  we  are  therefore  to  experience  the  help 


102    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

of  the  Holy  Spirit  in  our  hfe  and  work  we 
must  give  Him  an  opportunity  to  express  His 
power.  We  must  not  apply  the  brakes  of 
over-anxiety  about  anything,  for  however  high 
our  motive  may  be,  we  simply  succeed  in  de- 
feating the  end  we  have  in  view.  It  is  possible 
for  us  to  counteract  all  this,  to  bring  ourselves 
into  a  state  of  repose,  into  a  relaxed  psychic 
condition,  by  the  habitual  exercise  of  the  will, 
reinforced  by  the  aid  of  faith,  informing  the 
will  of  the  presence  of  the  power  of  the  Spirit 
who  is  our  ally  in  the  difficult  task. 

Hurry  is  also  a  non-conductor  of  spiritual 
power;  we  here  speak  of  hurry  as  a  mental 
attitude.  Hurry  is  too  keen  upon  the  next 
thing  or  the  thing  after  that,  it  has  no  past  or 
present.  It  lives  in  the  immediate  or  remote, 
future.  Hurry  does  not  treat  the  present 
moment  and  its  task  with  adequate  seriousness. 
It  is  apt  to  be  disrespectful  to  the  thing  in 
hand. 

That  is  why  people  are  apt  to  resent  our 
hurry,  that  is  why  they  look  upon  hurry  as 
undignified.  Because  in  the  attitude  of  hurry 
we  have  surrendered  the  present  to  the  future. 
That  is  to  run  away  from  the  spirit  of  God, 
it  is  to  get  out  of  step  with  the  true  rhythm  of 
life.     Consequently  it  not  only  cheapens  the 


Divine  Whisper  in  the  Soul       103 

work  in  hand,  but  it  vulgarises  our  own  soul. 
If  there  is  to  be  true  vision  of  the  things  that 
really  count  in  life,  if  there  is  to  be  a  place  of 
honour  for  the  memories  and  friendships  of 
the  past,  if  there  is  to  be  a  spirit  of  contentment 
within  us,  if  we  are  to  translate  the  mind  of 
Christ  into  life,  hurry  must  give  place  to 
concentrated  leisureliness. 

Deliberate  leisureliness  is  both  the  fruit  of 
the  presence  of  the  Spirit,  and  the  condition  of 
His  control  over  us.  It  is  by  this  means  we 
approach  our  work  with  our  whole  being,  and 
in  our  living  we  carry  into  the  future  our  mem- 
ories of  the  past,  our  obligations  to  friendships 
and  our  inspirations  from  them.  But  in  the 
case  of  the  mentally  hurried  both  the  memories 
of  the  past,  and  the  obligations  of  the  present 
are  in  the  way  of  being  sacrificed  by  a  process 
of  elimination.  In  making  for  leisureliness  in 
living  the  Divine  Spirit  thus  seeks  to  keep  us 
faithful  to  our  friendships  of  the  past,  to  the 
memories  of  the  past  which  should  have  an 
influence  upon  us,  and  also  faithful  to  the 
sacred  importance  of  the  work  of  the  pres- 
ent hour. 

A  great  man  said  he  was  too  busy  to  be 
in  a  hurry.  For  it  is  the  present  hour 
which    is    the    most    sacred    hour    in    our 


V 


104    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

lives,  it  is  the  one  hour  which  we  can 
make   vital   with   reahty. 

Fear  is  another  non-conductor  of  spiritual 
power,  the  fear  of  people,  of  circumstances,  of 
the  consequences  of  a  decision,  or  of  a  step 
which  we  know  to  be  right.  It  arises  through 
the  imagination  being  uncontrolled  by  the  will, 
or  misdirected.  The  imagination  instead  of 
being  an  ally  to  the  rest  of  the  life  in  its  effort 
to  advance  has  become  an  enemy,  its  influ- 
ence tending  to  repress  and  contract  person- 
ality, rather  than  to  encourage  and  expand  it, 
so  that  the  powers  of  the  inner  life  are  par- 
alysed. And  the  result  is  far  reaching  in  its 
effects.  The  spirit  is  depressed,  and  joyless, 
and  even  the  body  suffers  from  the  benumb- 
ing influence. 

We  greatly  underestimate  the  influence  of 
fear  upon  our  physical  life.  It  may  be  that 
some  chronic  fear  which  has  no  right  what- 
ever to  be  in  our  lives  is  the  only  cause  of  our 
remaining  physically  below  par.  And  in  this 
condition  we  spread  the  contagion  of  depres- 
sion. But  fear  cannot  be  dispelled  merely  by 
willing.  The  will  must  be  reinforced  by  an 
energy  capable  of  dispelling  it.  And  that 
energy  is  love,  sympathy,  the  outgoing  of  our 
elemental  life  in  unselfish  contact  with  others. 


Divine  Whisper  in  the  Soul       105 

As  light  dispels  darkness,  so  "perfect  love 
casteth  out  fear." 

Of  course,  we  are  here  speaking  of  love  as  a 
working  force,  not  as  a  mere  gush  of  feeling 
which  may  be  neither  ethical  nor  rational. 

It  is  that  power  which  is  the  soul  of  life, 
and  in  which  all  the  activities  of  our  mind  find 
their  highest  possibility.  But  how  are  we 
to  get  love  started  as  a  working  force? 

The  Spirit  of  God  as  we  obey  His  prompt- 
ings in  the  common  tasks  of  the  day,  sheds 
abroad  within  us  the  sense  of  the  Divine  love 
towards  us.  It  is  a  matter  of  experience  that 
as  obedient  souls  we  become  increasingly  con- 
scious of  living  in  the  encircling  love  of  God 
revealed  through  Christ. 

The  Divine  Love  becomes  the  sun  of  our 
soul.  And  while  we  are  in  the  attitude  of 
obedience  in  the  ordinary  affairs  of  daily  life, 
this  sense  of  the  Divine  love  to  us  works  out 
into  our  relation  to  others  as  the  light  of  the 
sun  is  reflected  from  a  window.  Only  it  is 
not  a  mere  reflection  in  our  case,  it  is  the  actual 
working  out  of  a  divine  quality.  As  we  allow 
the  spirit  of  God  to  guide  our  thoughts,  in  that 
normal  attitude  of  mind,  the  essence  of  the 
Divine  being  which  is  love  takes  possession 
of  us.    And  the  Spirit  seeks  to  arouse  our  will 


106    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

to  translate  the  Divine  deposit  in  our  lives 
into  conduct. 

The  will  is  also  stimulated  in  its  work  by 
imagination  picturing  to  us  what  others  have 
a  right  to  receive  from  us,  by  imagination  put- 
ting us  in  other  people's  places,  by  our  seeing 
with  clear  vision  the  needs  of  other  lives. 
When  we  hear  of  some  case  of  dire  poverty 
or  terrible  suffering,  it  is  imagination  which 
inspires  our  will  to  action.  Therefore  we  say 
that  if  our  imagination  is  under  the  control  of 
the  Spirit  of  God  it  becomes  a  powerful  aid 
to  the  will  in  the  direction  of  the  expression  of 
sympathy.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  imagination 
is  not  under  the  guidance  of  the  Spirit,  playing 
the  part  of  an  uncontrolled  faculty,  then  the 
power  of  the  will  may  not  only  be  neutralised, 
but  also  uninformed  as  to  what  to  do. 
•  For  thoughtlessness  towards  others  often 
simply  arises  through  lack  of  imagination.  The 
imagination  has  been  engaged,  it  may  be,  in 
foolish  and  harmful  work,  when  it  might  have 
been  busy  informing  the  will  of  the  needs  of 
others.  It  is  clear  then  that  the  Divine  Spirit 
may  aid  us  in  establishing  the  psychological 
conditions  of  spiritual  power,  and  we  also  may 
aid  Him  in  gaining  the  ascendancy  in  our  lives 
by  exercising  the  will  upon  these  psychological 


Divine  Whisper  in  the  Soul       107 

points.  For  His  purpose  within  us  is  to  com- 
pletely unify  our  being  so  that  we  shall  be  able 
to  carry  out  into  life  the  spirit  and  programme 
of  Christ.  Our  Divine  helper  seeks  to  make  us 
fit  for  our  task,  by  making  the  inner  life  a  unit, 
and  by  that  unit  becoming  a  channel  of  the 
energy  of  Divine  love,  and  thus  throwing  off 
the  paralysing  influence  of  fear.  This  is  the 
way  in  which  we  achieve  our  spiritual  freedom. 


XII 

WHAT  IS  OUR  ATTITUDE  TOWARDS  LIFE? 

WHEN  we  have  entered  into  compan- 
ionship with  the  Hving  Christ,  in- 
spired by  the  indwelHng  presence 
of  His  Spirit,  we  become  conscious  of  having 
a  definite  part  in  the  world  programme  of  our 
Master.  Our  hfe  and  our  local  duties  may  be 
very  obscure,  but  that  need  not  alter  the  fact 
that  we  have  a  distinct  part  to  play  in  a  uni- 
versal plan.  It  is  our  privilege  when  we  live 
in  union  with  our  Lord  to  be  in  the  rhythm  of 
His  world  purpose.  This  does  not  depend  in 
any  sense  upon  the  largeness  of  our  sphere, 
nor  upon  the  importance  of  our  work,  viewed 
from  a  worldly  point  of  view.  We  become 
cosmopolitan  in  our  outlook  upon  life  because 
our  lives  have  become  keyed  to  the  cosmopoli- 
tan note  which  is  the  genius  of  the  programme 
of  Christ.  Through  the  keyhole  of  a  certain 
garden  gate  in  Rome  it  is  possible  to  have  a 
most  impressive  view  of  the  Church  of  St. 

108 


Our  Attitude  towards  Life      109 

Peter.  And  from  the  narrowest  lot  in  life  it 
is  possible  to  have  a  worldwide  outlook  and 
sympathy,  to  have  a  distinct  part  to  play  in  the 
most  stupendous  scheme  that  has  ever  claimed 
the  attention  of  the  human  mind. 

Through  our  relation  to  Christ  we  have 
become  cosmopolitan  in  the  very  highest  sense 
of  that  word.  We  have  a  relation  to  the  life 
nearest  to  us,  and  to  the  last  man  in  the  islands 
of  the  seas.  We  are  related  to  the  whole 
world,  and  to  the  Eternal,  at  the  same  time. 
But  our  relation  to  the  world  moves  from  the 
centre  outwards.  Our  bond  with  the  large 
affairs  of  the  universal  is  through  fidelity  to 
the  small  affairs  of  our  particular  sphere.  The 
duties  of  the  hour  provide  our  point  of  contact 
with  the  vast  concerns  which  are  in  the  mind 
of  Christ.  The  work  of  the  present  hour  may 
not  be  congenial  to  us.  The  life  work  to  which 
many  find  themselves  bound  may  not  be  the 
work  that  they  would  choose  for  themselves. 

But  we  rise  above  slavery  to  our  work,  by 
doing  it  for  Christ.  That  motive  emancipates 
our  souls  from  the  despotism  of  circumstances. 
And  that  motive  secures  the  development  of 
personality  in  any  sphere  of  work  or  suffering, 
and  it  is  consistent  with  enterprise,  fairness  to 
our  neighbour,  and  the  progress  of  the  world. 


110    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

Our  union  with  our  Master  may  not  free  us 
from  the  uncongenial  task,  but  when  we  do 
our  work  for  Him,  in  His  sight,  we  find  that 
we  are  free.  The  difficuUies  of  our  lot  instead 
of  throwing  us  into  chains  of  servitude,  only 
tend  to  make  the  emancipation  of  our  souls 
more  complete. 

The  man  of  largest  Christian  personahty 
found  his  spiritual  expansion  in  a  hard  place. 
We  maintain  this  attitude  of  inner  freedom  by 
steadfastly  refusing  to  be  ensnared  by  the  in- 
fluence of  past  failures,  and  shortcomings.  H 
St.  Paul  had  permitted  his  former  mistakes  to 
invade  the  enthusiasms  of  his  apostolic  life,  he 
would  have  been  paralysed  into  fatal  depres- 
sion, and  discouragement.  But  in  the  forward 
march  of  his  life  he  dared  not  to  think  of  his 
past  mistakes  except  through  the  forgiving 
love  of  God  in  Christ.  The  presence  of  Christ 
saved  the  new  enthusiasms  of  the  Apostle  from 
being  frost  bitten  by  the  wintry  blast  of  past 
memories.  And  if  we  are  to  persist  in  our  part 
of  the  programme  of  Christ  it  must  be  through 
the  resolute  exercise  of  the  will  as  it  insists 
upon  our  thoughts  being  taken  up  with  the 
Divine  will  for  us  in  the  present  rather  than  by 
being  intimidated,  and  weakened,  by  memories 
which  would  turn  enthusiasm  into  despair. 


Our  Attitude  towards  Life      111 

In  this  attitude  of  working  upon  our  part  of 
the  programme  of  Christ,  and  in  doing  it  for 
Him  we  find  ourselves  at  peace  with  God,  with 
ourselves  and  with  our  fellowmen.  For  peace 
is  not  something  that  comes  down  to  us  like 
apples  shaken  from  a  tree.  Peace  is  the  result 
of  the  fulfillment  of  certain  conditions,  as  heat 
or  cold  is.  The  peace  which  the  presence 
of  Christ  creates  comes  through  our  being 
brought  into  normal  relations  with  our 
environment,  as  a  dislocated  joint  brought 
back  into  its  normal  position  may  result  in 
peace.  In  so  far  as  we  are  obedient  we  find 
ourselves  at  home  in  the  presence  of  God.  We 
are  reverent  but  unafraid,  there  is  no  strain  or 
shrinking  in  the  relationship. 

It  is  so  natural  that  we  increasingly  find 
Christ  becoming  the  home  of  our  thoughts, 
they  return  to  him  for  inspiration  and  adjust- 
ment. The  Eternal  does  not  strike  terror 
within  us,  the  solemn  realities  of  the  imseen 
world  become  the  source  of  our  strength  rather 
than  of  perplexing  dread.  For  we  have  noth- 
ing to  hide,  nothing  to  fear,  we  are  at  one  with 
the  Divine  will.  And  we  are  at  peace  with 
ourselves,  in  the  sense  that  we  have  found  a 
dominating  purpose,  a  ruling  passion.  The 
will  of  Christ  acting  upon  us  both  as  a  vision 


112    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

of  practical  duty,  and  as  a  motive  in  doing  it, 
secures  for  us  the  unification  of  our  inner  Hfe 
in  doing  our  share  of  work.  It  is  just  this 
lack  of  a  ruHng  passion  which  is  the  cause  of 
inner  dissatisfaction  in  many  instances. 

For  example,  a  young  woman  comes  home 
from   school   or   college   with   a   magnificent 
mental  equipment,  and  her  life  is  taken  up  with 
a  few  light  duties  at  home,  some  reading,  exer- 
cise, and  amusement,  but  if  there  is  no  supreme 
aim,  if  no  one  thing  really  dominates  the  mind, 
then  the  working  unity  of  the  inner  life  has  not 
been    secured.      Several    interests    of    equal 
strength  cancel  the  effectiveness  of  each  other. 
Conflicting   motives   unsettle   and   harass   the 
soul.     The  result  is  that  while  there  may  be 
a  very  real  culture  of  the  faculties,  there  is  no 
deep  peace,  no  abiding  contentment,  no  fusion 
of  the  faculties,  in  the  pursuit  of  a  dominating 
aim.    But  the  will  of  Christ,  accepted  as  a  pro- 
gramme to  be  realised  in  practical  life,  as  well 
as  a  motive  power  in  carrying  it  out,  will  bring 
inner  peace,  contentment,  and  spiritual  liberty. 
No  one,  of  course,  dare  say  for  another  what 
the  programme  of  Christ  shall  be.     We  must 
individually  find  that  out   for  ourselves.     It 
may  be  that  the  things  we  are  now  doing  from 
day  to  day  will  remain  the  same.     It  may  be 


Our  Attitude  towards  Life       113 

otherwise.  But  whether  or  not  we  shall  be  able 
to  bring  the  spiritual  motive  into  what  we  do, 
we  shall  be  able  to  bring  our  lives  into  the  mind 
of  Christ,  and  by  so  doing  we  have  made  pos- 
sible the  inner  unity  of  our  being. 

Another  element  in  the  peace  which  the  pres- 
ence of  the  will  of  Christ  in  our  lives  estab- 
lishes springs  from  being  in  sympathetic  rela- 
tionship with  our  fellow  men.  There  can  be 
no  deep  peace  for  us  if  we  live  in  cynical,  or 
even  pious,  aloofness  from  the  problems  of 
humanity.  An  anti-social  attitude  of  life  or 
mind  makes  peace  a  psychological  impossi- 
bility. Shrewd  worldly  detachment  from  the 
cares  of  humanity,  looking  out  only  for  per- 
sonal advantage,  is  a  tragedy  in  the  soul.  So 
long  as  love  does  not  reign  within  us  in  our 
relation  to  our  fellows,  however  perverse  their 
actions  towards  us  may  be,  there  can  be  no 
genuine  abiding  peace. 

It  is  as  we  fit  our  lives  sympathetically  into 
the  jolt  and  jar,  into  the  plain  and  rude  facts 
of  practical  existence  that  we  experience  the 
final  element  of  peace.  It  was  from  the  very 
heart  of  such  life  that  Jesus  spoke  of  His 
peace.  It  was  while  men  repudiated  Him,  and 
flung  His  sympathy  towards  them  back  into 
His  face  that  He  maintained  the  attitude  of 


114    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

unbroken  kindness.  And  it  was  because  He 
thus  patiently  persisted  in  loving  that  He  had 
perfect  peace. 

It  is  as  we  face  the  problems  of  our  lot,  set 
free  from  self-onsciousness,  our  life  in  har- 
mony with  God,  ourselves,  and  the  world, 
finding  our  work,  and  our  supreme  motive  in 
doing  it,  through  obedience  to  Christ,  it  is  in 
this  attitude  we  are  able  to  continue  our  task, 
to  keep  steadily  on  our  way.  There  are  voices 
calling  us  in  every  direction,  some  urging  to 
put  the  emphasis  of  our  life  and  work  on  one 
point,  some  on  another,  until  multitudes  are 
confused  and  shift  the  emphasis  of  their  life 
from  one  point  to  another,  back  and  forth, 
according  to  the  most  recent  or  most  powerful 
influence  brought  to  bear  upon  them.  But 
when  we  seek  to  take  our  direction  from  the 
living  Christ  we  are  thus  steadied  in  mind 
against  the   bewildering   distractions   of   our 

time. 

And  this  is  one  of  the  supreme  needs,  that 
we  shall  persist  in  that  type  of  life,  and  service 
which  we  believe  to  be  inspired  by  the  mind  of 
Christ.  For  there  is  no  guarantee  whatever 
of  the  continuance  of  that  type  of  life  or  work 
which  is  the  mere  echo  of  surroundings.  It  is 
in  this  way  all  kinds  of  hobbies  are  taken  up 


Our  Attitude  towards  Life      115 

enthusiastically  for  a  time,  and  then  abandoned 
for  something  else.  And  in  such  activity  there 
can  be  no  real  approach  towards  anything  like 
unity  of  purpose  among  workers,  nor  towards 
the  deepening  of  the  convictions  of  those  work- 
ers. If  our  work  is  to  have  a  sacramental 
influence  upon  our  personality,  the  impulse  of 
that  work  must  be  born  in  the  deeps  of  our 
own  rational  and  spiritual  life.  And  it  is  as  we 
abide  in  Christ  that  what  we  do  for  Christ  and 
men  becomes  the  expression  of  our  deepest 
selves,  and  not  the  mere  impact  of  current  opin- 
ions stirring  us  into  activity  for  a  brief  season. 


XIII 

SERVICE  FROM  CENTRE  TO  CIRCUMFERENCE 

IN  our  relation  to  the  world  programme  of 
Christ  our  immediate  sphere  of  activity 
will,  of  course,  depend  upon  our  natural 
gifts,  our  education,  our  circumstances,  and 
our  willingness  to  be  led  by  the  Divine  will. 
Whatever  may  be  the  work  that  shall  engage 
the  largest  amount  of  our  time,  and  thought, 
the  thing  of  first  importance  in  connection  with 
it  is  that  we  shall  there  be  able  to  be  true  to 
the  Spirit  of  Christ.  That  being  understood, 
we  can  serve  the  purpose  of  Christ  in  any 
sphere  which,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  is  the  place 
for  us.  For  the  first  contribution  which  we 
make  to  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of  God 
on  earth  is  that  which  springs  from  the  incor- 
ruptible integrity  of  our  own  being.  As  we 
live  in  fellowship  with  our  Lord  in  any  form 
of  enterprise,  whether  it  be  commercial,  pro- 
fessional, or  whatever  it  may  be,  we  throw  off 
all  unconsciously  an  influence  which  is  the  most 

116 


From  Centre  to  Circumference    117 

powerful  and  uplifting  reality  in  the  coming  of 
the  Divine  Kingdom, 

Nothing  can  be  more  important  than  the 
Spirit  of  Christ  in  a  life  as  a  contribution  to  the 
solution  of  the  problems  of  human  society.  No 
amount  of  cleverness,  or  industry,  can  make  up 
for  the  lack  of  that  Spirit  which  is  at  once 
both  strong  principle,  and  an  atmosphere  of 
kindness.  It  is  the  first  thing  which  we  owe 
to  this  world,  to  our  families,  our  friends,  and 
to  the  outer  circle  of  our  obligations.  Our 
patriotism  is  not  genuine  unless  we  are  genu- 
ine. A  man  owes  a  contribution  of  personal 
integrity  to  the  concern  of  which  he  may  be  a 
member,  or  an  employee.  It  is  an  entirely  false 
view  of  corporate  life  to  say  that  a  man's  pri- 
vate character  is  a  purely  personal  affair.  It  is 
nothing  of  the  kind.  If  the  national  expense 
incurred  by  the  sins  of  men  and  women,  the 
evil  example  of  their  lives,  the  false  standards, 
and  precedents  they  have  set  up,  the  discour- 
agement of  other  lives  through  their  brutal 
actions,  if  the  whole  black  mortgage  upon  soci- 
ety could  be  wiped  out,  if  every  man  lived  a 
straight  and  Christlike  life  we  should  begin  to 
see  the  outlines  of  the  Heavenly  Kingdom 
on  earth. 

The  Kingdom  of  God  must  first  come  within 


118    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

ourselves.  And  it  has  come  as  we  remain  in 
the  attitude  of  surrender  to  the  mind  of  Christ. 
This  is  the  first  contribution  which  we  bring 
to  our  family  life  when  we  leave  our  room 
in  the  morning.  And  if  we  do  not  bring  that 
contribution  into  the  heart  of  our  family  life, 
it  is  not  likely  that  we  shall  genuinely  bring 
it  elsewhere.  For  the  unit  of  Christian  Society 
is  the  family.  And  no  civihsation  can  ever 
ignore  the  stability  of  the  family  life  which 
is  its  base. 

In  our  modern  haste  for  large  results,  for 
conspicuous  successes,  let  us  solemnly  ask, 
have  we  paid  the  obligation  we  owe  at  home? 
have  we  brought  the  spirit  of  Christ  to  the 
breakfast  table?  Have  we  brought  our  share 
of  conviction  to  the  establishing,  maintaining 
and  vitalising  of  family  religion?  Have  we 
brought  as  much  of  our  intelligent,  patient, 
interested  selves  to  the  hour  of  leisure  around 
the  fireside  as  we  have  brought  to  outside 
causes?  Have  the  members  of  our  families 
received  from  us  what  we  have  imparted  to 
others?  Many  clever  answers  are  given  by 
us  to  such  questions  when  we  try  to  vindicate 
ourselves  in  embarrassing  moments  of  con- 
scious neglect  of  our  own  inner  circle.  But  the 
fact  remains  that  it  is  because  of  the  impov- 


From  Centre  to  Circumference     119 

erishment,  the  weakening,  of  family  life 
through  absorbing  interests  elsewhere  that  our 
social  problems  are  aggravated  and  made 
more  intricate  all  along  the  line. 

Family  life  as  an  institution  is  a  moral 
achievement  of  the  centuries  and  to  neglect  it, 
to  disfigure  it,  to  dishonour  it,  is  to  go  back- 
wards. It  matters  not  what  kind  of  act  it  is  that 
mars  the  beauty,  the  peace,  the  moral  prog- 
ress of  the  family  life,  it  is  a  blow  struck 
at  an  institution  which  is  the  bulwark  of 
civilisation.  And  the  attack  comes  from  the 
most  various  quarters.  It  is  occasionally  made 
in  a  modern  novel.  While  from  another  direc- 
tion, from  those  who  are  earnestly  and  hon- 
estly engaged  in  the  uplift  of  the  world,  there 
is  sometimes,  unconsciously,  an  attitude  of 
slackness  in  regard  to  family  obligation  arising 
from  excessive  engrossment  in  outside  affairs. 

And  there  is  a  temptation  before  the  minds 
of  many  young  people  to  think  that  they  have 
no  definite  obligation  to  bring  a  contribution 
of  enrichment  to  the  family  life.  They  only 
require,  however,  to  give  the  matter  some  little 
thought  to  realise  that  the  whole  responsibility 
in  the  matter  does  not  rest  upon  their  parents. 
Even  the  lack  of  cultivating  the  habit  of 
regular   and    frequent   writing   of    letters    to 


120    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

inform  the  home  circle  of  what  is  of  vital  con- 
cern, while  at  school  or  college,  is  a  thing  of 
more  serious  injury  to  the  family  relation  than 
appears  on  the  surface.  If  we  are  living  in 
obedience  to  the  mind  of  Christ  it  must  be  that 
we  shall  bring  more  to  the  family  life  and  not 
less.  For  His  presence  imparts  to  us  exactly 
those  qualities  by  which  the  family  existence 
is  sweetened  and  unified. 

But  while  Christian  charity  begins  at  home 
it  does  not  end  there.  We  have  a  direct  rela- 
tion to  our  community,  our  country,  and  to 
the  world.  And  as  we  are  faithful  to  the 
Spirit  of  Christ  we  shall  recognise  that  how- 
ever small  our  contribution  of  interest  and 
service  must  inevitably  be,  yet  that  can  be  no 
reason  for  ignoring  our  obligation.  The  temp- 
tation in  this  direction  is  naturally  great.  Since 
public  opinion  does  not  always  demand  our 
interest  and  service,  in  fact  it  sometimes  is  most 
ungrateful  and  ungracious  to  those  who  give 
themselves  unsparingly  to  the  public  good. 
Nevertheless,  it  is  the  will  of  Christ  that  has 
become  the  law  of  our  life,  and  the  gratitude 
or  ingratitude  of  a  society  or  community  can- 
not determine  our  actions. 

It  is  not  the  amount  of  service  which  we  are 
able  to  render  that  is  the  important  thing,  it  is 


From  Centre  to  Circumference     121 

the  moral  influence  upon  others  of  our  intelli- 
gent interest.  That  interest  on  our  part  may 
inspire  others  to  do  that  for  which  we  have 
neither  time  nor  capacity.  It  might  be  a  very 
great  service  to  a  community  or  to  the  nation 
if  we  would  devote  some  of  our  leisure  to 
informing  ourselves  upon  the  processes  by 
which  things  for  the  public  good  are  brought 
to  pass.  A  course  of  reading  upon  parliament- 
ary law,  the  function  of  the  primary,  the 
methods  of  legislative  procedure,  informing 
ourselves  upon  the  dark  ways  of  those  who 
seek  to  defeat  the  decrees  of  public  sentiment, 
such  pursuit  would  redeem  the  mind  from  the 
effeminate  influence  of  so  much  of  our  reading 
that  leads  to  no  practical  result.  There  can  be 
no  real  enthusiasm  for  public  service  until  there 
is  more  widespread  information  upon  the  ways 
by  which  the  public  mind  can  be  enlightened, 
and  its  enlightened  will  carried  into  effect. 

Christian  people,  too  often  in  the  past,  have 
looked  upon  life  as  divided  into  two  sections, 
sacred  and  secular.  It  is  this  unspiritual  view 
of  life  which  is  in  part  to  blame  for  the  deplor- 
able condition  into  which  politics,  and  com- 
merce, have  sometimes  fallen.  What  can  we 
expect  the  spheres  of  human  enterprise  to  be- 
come if  they  are  paganised  by  Christian  people. 


122    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

if  so-called  followers  of  Christ  have  no  con- 
science upon  the  translation  of  the  teaching  of 
Sunday  into  the  business  of  Monday?  Christ 
seeks  the  sanctification  of  the  whole  of  human 
life  and  its  institutions,  that  is  what  Ee  meant 
by  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  upon 
earth. 

And  this  will  be  accomplished  not  by  the 
secularising  of  religion,  but  by  the  spiritual- 
ising of  the  whole  realm  of  life.  And  that  is 
the  glorious  and  difficult  task  He  has  laid  upon 
His  disciples  in  our  day.  It  is  to  unify  and 
exalt,  and  baptise  into  the  Kingdom  of  God 
every  sphere  of  human  activity.  It  is  to  Chris- 
tianise every  sphere  of  human  interest  so  that 
there  shall  be  no  pagan  spot  in  the  institutions 
of  our  civilisation. 

And  this  crusade,  this  holy  war,  cannot  be 
carried  on  without  its  martyrdoms,  without 
men  having  sometimes  to  appear  to  fail  in 
order  to  all  the  more  succeed.  We  have  a 
place  of  honour  for  those  who  have  given  their 
lives  for  their  country  in  battle.  We  do  not 
say  that  because  they  did  not  come  home  from 
the  war  that  they  failed.  Their  names  are 
inscribed  on  brass  in  our  public  places.  The 
social  conscience  has  yet  to  be  educated  up  to 
honour  him  who  is  too  courageous  and  honest 


From  Centre  to  Circumference    123 

to  grasp  a  cheap  success  with  the  iron  grip  of 
greed.  The  spiritual  discernment  of  the  mass 
of  men  has  yet  to  be  trained  to  see  the  martyr 
in  business,  in  poHtics,  in  art.  We  are  not  here 
apologising  for  weak  incompetence  in  the  work 
of  the  world,  we  are  not  seeking  a  laurel 
wreath  for  indolence  and  stupidity,  but  rather 
for  those  who  could  easily  escape  martyrdom 
if  they  ran  away  from  absolute  principle  in  the 
conduct  of  affairs. 

But  the  programme  of  Christ  stretches  be- 
yond nationality,  it  knows  no  geographical 
limitations.  And  He  appeals  to  the  heroic 
instincts  of  every  disciple  to  have  a  share  in  His 
universal  purpose.  The  day  is  swiftly  coming 
when  the  sublime  heroism  and  the  profound 
wisdom  of  Christian  missionaries  will  be  rec- 
ognised through  what  they  have  achieved  in 
the  spiritual,  intellectual  and  social  life  of 
nations.  We  would  not  narrow  that  work  to 
what  has  been  done  by  heroic  missionaries,  for 
the  Christian  diplomatist,  the  merchant,  and 
the  mechanic  have  had  their  share  in  the  tri- 
umph of  the  will  of  Christ  in  foreign  lands. 
And  they  will  increasingly  have  their  spiritual 
opportunity. 

But  it  is  not  only  the  workers  on  the  actual 
field  who  are  permitted  to  take  a  definite  part 


124    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

in  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom  in  the  distant 
parts  of  the  world.  There  are  people  hving  in 
the  United  States  and  England  who  either 
have  their  own  missionary  representative,  or 
combine  with  two  or  three  others  in  the  priv- 
ilege, through  their  Church  Boards.  There 
are  women  busy  in  other  directions  who  gather 
information  regarding  the  progress  of  the 
Divine  Kingdom  in  foreign  parts  and  tell  it 
to  their  friends.  There  are  circles  of  Chris- 
tians who  gather  to  forget  their  own  spiritual 
needs,  in  the  attitude  of  passionate  and  intelli- 
gent intercession  for  workers  and  work  in  the 
dark  places  of  the  world. 

Such  action  is  helping  to  make  the  whole 
world  a  neighbourhood,  the  various  parts  of 
which  seem  to  grow  less  remote  every  day. 
And  some  of  those  who  once  sneered  at  the 
enterprise  of  Christ  in  the  largeness  of  its 
world  grasp,  are  beginning  to  be  ashamed  as 
they  see  the  marvellous  results  of  quiet,  patient 
toil,  looming  up  into  gigantic  social  facts,  suffi- 
ciently dramatic  to  inspire  the  imagination  of 
Christendom  with  a  vision  of  worldwide 
triumph. 


xrv 

PLACES  OF  EMPHASIS  IN  SERVICE 

THE  places  of  emphasis  in  service, 
according  to  the  programme  of  Christ, 
are  both  individual  and  social,  both 
spiritual  and  material.  There  is  no  contradic- 
tion between  them,  they  are  the  counterparts 
of  each  other.  The  individual  life  influences 
society,  and  society  affects  the  individual.  The 
spiritual  aspect  of  life  powerfully  affects  the 
material,  and  material  conditions  exercise  an 
influence  upon  spiritual  conditions. 

The  unfortunate  thing  in  the  past  has  been 
that  earnest  people  have  tried  to  separate  what 
Christ  has  joined  together.  Some  have  clung 
to  the  individual  element  in  the  programme  of 
Christ,  while  others  have  chosen  the  social  side. 
Many  have  insisted  upon  the  spiritual  aspect, 
ignoring  material  conditions,  and  others  have 
emphasised  material  conditions  to  the  exclu- 
sion of  spiritual  concerns.  The  result  has 
been  disastrous,  for  it  has  to  a  large  degree 

125 


126    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

separated  workers  who  should  be  working  in 
the  unity  of  one  dominating  purpose.  It  has 
had  the  effect  of  setting  up  false  and  arbitrary- 
divisions,  which  Christ  never  intended  should 
exist. 

The  disrupting  of  this  vital  unity  has  incal- 
culably weakened  the  work  and  the  workers 
in  both  spheres.  It  has  tended  to  shut  off 
spiritual  work  from  the  practical  facts  of 
social  reality  with  the  result  that  spiritual  work 
has  sometimes  not  been  preserved  because  it 
had  no  social  atmosphere  in  which  to  thrive. 
There  have  been  revivals  which  have  not  been 
survivals.  On  the  other  hand,  social  workers 
have  sometimes  lacked  spiritual  inspiration, 
and  their  social  work  has  not  been  maintained 
because  the  individuals  who  have  been  socially 
and  materially  benefited  by  their  work  have 
not  had  spirituality  enough  to  keep  hold  upon 
the  benefits  they  had  received.  So  that  by 
ignoring  each  other  workers  in  both  spheres 
have  too  often  sadly  to  witness  the  undoing 
of  a  great  amount  of  their  work. 

When  we  say  that  the  place  of  supreme 
emphasis  in  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of  God 
is  the  spiritual  life  of  the  individual,  we  do  not 
thereby  minimise  or  dishonour  the  importance 
of   material   and    social   service,    nor   do   we 


Places  of  Emphasis  in  Service      127 

thereby  separate  the  two  counterparts  of  one 
whole.  We  simply  declare  what  clearly  is  the 
method  of  Christ  in  establishing  the  Kingdom 
of  God  in  human  society.  It  was  through 
Christian  individuals  that  a  Christian  Society 
was  first  created.  It  is  through  individuals  that 
social  changes  are  continually  taking  place. 
Those  who  are  working  most  vigorously  for 
social  redemption  are  making  their  impression 
upon  society  as  individuals. 

So  that  while  they  may  realise  it  or  not,  all 
workers  in  practice  put  the  supreme  emphasis 
upon  the- inner  life  of  the  individual.  For  it  is 
through  the  individual  worker  the  social  mes- 
sage is  proclaimed,  the  social  work  achieved. 
And  it  is  through  the  soul  of  the  individual 
worker,  for  whatever  his  message  may  be,  it 
springs  from  his  spiritual  vision  and  sympathy. 
Therefore  we  contend  that  experience  proves 
the  spiritual  life  of  the  individual  to  be  the 
supreme  place  of  emphasis  in  the  coming  of  the 
Kingdom  of  God.  And  when  we  say  the  spirit- 
ual life  of  the  individual,  we  mean  the  indi- 
vidual at  the  earliest  possible  period  of  his  life. 
Scientific  investigation  has  shown  that  the 
lives  of  the  vast  majority  of  Christian  people 
were  most  profoundly  influenced  spiritually 
before  they   reached   eighteen  years  of   age. 


128    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

And  the  family  Hfe  should  be  the  chief  centre 
of  spiritual  influence. 

No  institution  whatever  can  take  the  place 
of  the  home  as  the  sphere  where  the  most  last- 
ing spiritual  impressions  may  be  inculcated. 
And  if  parents  are  to  exercise  their  high  priv- 
ilege of  having  the  opportunity  to  most  power- 
fully determine  the  spiritual  future  of  their 
children  they  must  get  their  work  done  early. 
For  sooner  than  they  can  realise  there  are  com- 
peting influences  in  an  entirely  opposite  direc- 
tion at  work  from  the  outside.  The  most  influ- 
ential element  in  the  making  of  the  Christian 
character  of  children  is  the  sincere,  natural, 
joyous,  Christian  life  of  their  parents.  Every 
form  of  instruction  is  second  in  importance 
as  compared  with  consistent  example.  But 
not  example  which  is  self-conscious,  trying  too 
hard  to  make  an  impression.  It  is  the  uncon- 
sciousness of  the  example  which  is  the  most 
telling  part  of  it. 

Self-conscious  piety  which  strains  after 
spiritual  results  must  defeat  the  end  it  has 
in  view.  For  professional  goodness  strikes  the 
youthful  life  with  horror.  It  is  dangerously 
possible  for  an  earnest  parent  to  try  too  hard 
to  spiritually  help  his  child.  In  the  attitude  of 
over-anxiety  there  is  little  or  no  faith  in  the 


Places  of  Emphasis  in  Service      129 

Spirit  of  God  as  co-operating  in  the  holy  work. 
Of  course,  there  is  the  opposite  extreme  of 
doing  nothing,  of  careless,  self-centred,  uncon- 
cern which  is  alarmingly  evident  everywhere, 
a  chronic,  thoughtless,  indolence  arising  from 
minds  soaked  through  by  the  atmosphere  of 
worldliness. 

Our  hope  for  the  large  coming  of  the  King- 
dom must  find  its  central  inspiration  from 
homes  where  the  eternal  life  is  lived  in  happy, 
beautiful  contact  with  the  common  facts  of 
existence ;  and  where  intelligent,  prayerful  aid 
is  given  to  young,  growing  minds,  to  find  the 
places  of  emphasis  in  belief  and  conduct.  If 
parents  fail  to  seize  the  opportunity  which  the 
family  relation  affords  of  affecting  society  at 
its  foundation,  then  an  elder  brother  or  sister 
may  find  that  what  can  be  done  at  home  in 
spiritually  helping  younger  members  of  the 
family,  without  cant  or  superior  airs,  may 
prove  to  be  the  greatest  possible  service 
that  could  be  rendered.  St.  Andrew  did  his 
greatest  work  for  the  world  when  he  brought 
his  brother  to  Christ.  And  in  doing  that  he 
not  only  saved  a  youth,  who  had  combustible 
stuff  in  his  make-up,  from  an  uncertain  future, 
but  he  had  a  distinct  part  in  giving  St.  Peter 
to  the  service  of  the  Christian  Church. 


130    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

After  our  obligation  to  the  home  circle  we 
stand  committed  to  loyalty  to  all  disciples  of 
Christ. 

We  owe  our  fellow  Christians  our  pres- 
ence and  our  worship  with  them  of  our  com- 
mon Lord.  The  programme  of  Christ  has 
a  vital  place  for  the  recognition  of  the  unity 
of  believing  souls.  The  Christian  who  says  he 
can  worship  alone,  who  has  no  sense  of  need 
for  the  contemplation  of  God  in  Christ  in  com- 
pany with  the  other  Christians,  has  forgotten 
that  he  is  living  under  a  regime  in  which  his 
personal  inclinations  and  needs  are  not  the 
main  question.  We  belong  to  the  whole  Chris- 
tian fellowship.  For  the  sake  of  that  fellow- 
ship we  must  forget  ourselves.  We  are  mem- 
bers one  of  another,  and  as  such  we  must  come 
together  for  common  worship.  When  we 
think  supremely  of  our  individual  good,  we 
have  lost  the  Christian  accent,  and  emphasis. 

The  Church  of  Christ  stands  for  the  recog- 
nition of  the  essential  unity  of  all  true  Chris- 
tians, it  means  the  subordination  of  the  purely 
personal  element  to  the  universal  attitude  and 
function.  Our  relation  to  the  Church  is  first 
and  foremost  the  fulfilhnent  of  our  part  in  rec- 
ognising our  vital  relation  to  all  who  are  our 
brothers  in  Christ.    That  is  a  service  we  owe 


Places  of  Emphasis  in  Service      131 

to  the  family  spirit  in  the  Christian  brother- 
hood, as  well  as  a  high  privilege  which  we 
possess.  It  is  as  we  worship  together  we  give 
concrete  reality  to  the  fact  of  our  common 
union  with  Christ,  and  also  to  our  united  obli- 
gation to  co-operate  in  carrying  out  His 
programme. 

Not  only  is  this  solidarity  the  genius  of 
Christianity,  but  the  idea  is  one  of  the  most 
powerful  in  our  time.  Everywhere  common 
interests  and  pursuits  are  combining.  Groups 
of  people  gather  around  even  the  most  trivial 
interests,  as  well  as  the  most  momentous.  The 
uniting  of  forces  is  a  working  reality  in  every 
sphere  of  enterprise.  And  can  we  ignore  this 
principle  in  the  carrying  out  of  the  mind  of 
Christ?  We  need  an  enlightenment  of  con- 
science upon  what  we  owe  our  fellow  believers 
in  the  direction  of  fellowship  in  worship  as 
well  as  work.  We  dare  not  let  the  question  of 
our  advantage,  or  of  our  inclination,  determine 
the  attitude  in  which  we  shall  stand  to  those 
who,  like  ourselves,  are  seeking  to  bring  the 
will  of  Christ  to  reign  upon  the  earth. 

The  Sunday  school,  with  all  its  limitations, 
its  imperfect  methods,  is  the  immediate  sphere 
of  activity  which  the  Church  affords  to  the 
Christian  worker  as  he  seeks  to  influence  the 


132    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

spiritual  life  of  the  individual.     And  as  the 
Sunday  School  is  modernised  in  its  outlook, 
as  its  teachers  are  taught  the  true  places  of 
spiritual  emphasis,  as  the  Church  gives  more 
time  and  recognition  to  the  enormous  impor- 
tance of  the  work  which  the  Sunday  School  is 
trying  to  do,  it  will  enter  upon  a  new  era  of 
achievement.       How     much     efficiency     for 
extremely  difficult  tasks  can  we  expect  from  a 
body  of  devoted  men  and  women  who  have 
been  toiling  hard  all  through  the  week  at  other 
work,  as  they  come,  often  at  great  sacrifice,  to 
instruct  and  inspire  classes  of  young  people? 
They  have  not  had  enough  assistance  from  the 
various  quarters  which  might  have  rendered 
help  to  make  our  Sunday  School  teachers  effi- 
cient, and  effective  in  their  great  opportunity. 
We  need,  with  a  new  seriousness  to  see  that 
the  work  which  the  Sunday  School  is  trying 
to  do,  next  to  that  in  the  home  and  in  the 
ordinary  Church  service  is  the  most  important 
in  the  world.     Its  lack  of  efficiency  may  be 
criticised,  but  the  work  to  be  done,  the  place 
which  it  holds  for  the  spiritual  enlightenment 
of  the  rising  generation,  must  have  a  clear  right 
of  way,  as  of  surpassing  strategic  importance. 
In    the   meantime,    if   we   enter   the    Sunday 
School,   having   a   definite   growing   spiritual 


Places  of  Emphasis  in  Service      133 

experience  in  our  own  lives,  determined  to  put 
conscience,  faith  and  prayer  into  our  work 
there,  it  will  be  our  privilege  to  bring  some  into 
the  conscious  fellowship  of  the  living  Christ. 
In  so  doing  we  shall  make  spiritual  truth  all 
the  more  real  and  vivid  to  ourselves,  and  those 
whom  we  have  helped  may  look  back  upon 
what  took  place  in  those  early  days  as  the  most 
influential  reality  in  their  history. 

Of  course,  every  one  cannot  serve  in  the 
Sunday  School,  and  there  is  work  to  be  done  in 
society,  which  if  not  done  will  react  with  harm- 
ful effect  upon  the  work  of  the  Sunday  School. 
And  when  we  say  this  we  are  not  now  stepping 
down  into  a  lower  sphere  of  activity.  If  we 
are  led  to  devote  our  spare  time  by  helping  to 
create  public  sentiment  against  places  in  our 
community  which  are  a  menace  to  public  mo- 
rality we  are  still  working  with  Christ,  we  are 
still  bringing  in  the  Kingdom  of  God.  If  we 
are  impelled  to  work  patiently  for  clean  meth- 
ods at  a  district  primary,  we  are  still  doing 
spiritual  service,  if  we  retain  the  high  motive. 
If  we  go  into  a  city  council,  or  a  state  legis- 
lature, with  the  same  guidance  and  motive  we 
are  still  workers  together  with  Christ.  If  we 
make  a  study  of  social  conditions,  or  of  eco- 
nomic theories,  in  the  same  spirit  of  obedience 


134    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

to  what  we  beheve  to  be  the  mind  of  Christ, 
we  have  not  departed  from  the  high  purpose 
of  our  Master.  And  there  is  need  for  Chris- 
tian people  not  merely  to  beheve  this,  to  assent 
to  it  in  a  lukewarm  way,  but  to  hold  it  as  a 
passionate  conviction. 

It  is  when  personal  ambition  directs  our 
choice,  it  is  when  the  love  of  money  cankers 
our  motive,  it  is  when  envy  and  jealousy  be- 
come working  forces  in  our  activities,  then 
we  are  out  of  step  with  the  programme  of 
Christ.  And  it  matters  not  what  we  are  doing, 
whether  it  be  preaching,  teaching,  legislating, 
or  hammering  at  a  new  social  order,  we  have 
fallen  out  of  the  ranks  of  the  faithful,  if  our 
spirit  is  not  Christlike.  But  if  we  are  honestly 
seeking  to  do  the  will  of  our  Master  as  He 
has  revealed  it  to  us,  endeavouring  to  bring  in 
His  Kingdom  with  high  motives,  we  have  thus 
exalted  our  work  to  the  highest  level  and  we 
share  in  the  exaltation. 

And  at  the  same  time  we  come  closer  to 
every  other  worker  who  is  toiling  in  a  similar 
temper  and  all  such  work  moves  towards  the 
triumph  of  the  mind  and  spirit  of  Christ  in 
the  life  of  the  world. 


XV 

THE  GROWING  MIND  UNDER  CROSS- 
EXAMINATION 

AS  disciples  of  the  living  Christ  endeav- 
ouring to  enter  into  joyous  friend- 
ship with  Him,  and  into  obedience 
to  His  plan  for  us,  let  us  try  to  put  our- 
selves in  the  attitude  of  answering  some 
of  the  questions  which  are  put  to  us  by 
some  representatives  of  various  aspects  of 
opinion  in  our  day.  As  we  pursue  our  work 
in  the  world,  in  study,  in  business,  in  service, 
in  friendly  intercourse,  we  come  into  contact 
with  those  who  question  us  concerning  our 
faith.  As  perfectly  normal  members  of  society 
who  read  current  books,  and  are  in  sympathy 
with  all  sound  progressive  movements,  we 
must  be  ready  always  to  give  an  answer  to 
every  man  that  asketh  for  a  reason  of  the  hope 
that  is  in  us.  For  we  are  sometimes  put  upon 
the  witness-stand. 

135 


136    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

We  hear  the  question  of  the  Scientist,  who 
asks  us  if  we  beheve  in  the  scientific  spirit  and 
method,  if  we  have  read  the  works  of  modern 
writers  upon  scientific  thought  as  it  is  related 
to  rehgious  belief.  And  the  answer  we  give  is 
that  we  most  heartily  believe  in  the  scientific 
spirit  and  method,  and  that  there  are  few  books 
which  appeal  to  us  with  greater  interest  than 
those  which  deal  with  the  relation  of  science 
to  Christian  truth.  The  Scientist  asks  us 
whether  we  believe  in  the  reign  of  law,  and  if 
so,  whether  we  think  it  consistent  with  the 
practice  of  prayer.  We  find  no  dii^culty  in 
answering  that  we  believe  the  reign  of  law  to 
be  a  fact  throughout  the  universe,  law  mean- 
ing simply  the  orderly  method  by  which  God 
does  His  work.  And  that  there  are  more  laws 
in  the  universe  than  those  which  we  see  in 
operation.  And  one  law  is  frequently  able  to 
cancel  another  law,  as  the  law  of  death  which 
is  at  work  when  one  has  taken  a  poison  is  can- 
celled by  another  law  working  through  the 
antidote  administered  by  the  physician.  We 
see  no  breach  of  the  reign  of  law  in  the  practice 
of  prayer,  for  prayer  is  not  the  attempt  to  bring 
God  down  to  our  arbitrary  desires,  it  is  rather 
the  process  by  which  we  are  lifted  up  into  the 
realm  of  spiritual  reality,  and  in  that  realm  we 


Under  Cross-Examination        137 

become  spiritual  channels  of  what  may  be  the 
will  of  God. 

The  philosopher  sometimes  asks  us  how  we 
come  to  translate  the  First  Cause  of  the  uni- 
verse as  expressed  by  such  writers  as  Herbert 
Spencer  into  the  idea  of  a  personal  God.  And 
we  reply  that  we  have  a  perfect  right  to  inter- 
pret the  First  Cause  in  terms  of  the  highest 
which  we  find  in  ourselves.  And  when  we  see 
God  revealed  by  Christ  we  instinctively  know 
the  revelation  to  be  a  true  one,  in  the  same  way 
that  we  know  a  picture  to  be  beautiful.  And 
more  especially  when  we  find  our  intuitive 
sense  confirmed  by  the  convictions  and  experi- 
ence of  so  many  others,  who  have  impressed 
us  by  the  elevation  of  their  character. 

We  cannot  prove  our  contention,  but  we  are 
able  to  prove  it  quite  as  much  as  we  can  prove 
many  other  things  which  we  accept  implicitly. 

We  are  occasionally  cross-examined  by  the 
moralist,  by  the  man  who  believes  in  a  good, 
straight  life,  but  not  in  the  Christian  message 
of  the  forgiving  Grace  of  God  which  we  accept 
by  faith.  The  moralist  asks  us  if  we  believe 
in  salvation  by  character  and  when  we  answer 
in  the  affirmative,  he  continues  his  question  to 
enquire  whether  we  believe  in  salvation  by 
faith.    And  when  we  insist  that  we  emphat- 


\ 


138    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

ically  do,  he  enquires  whether  we  do  not  think 
that  to  be  an  inconsistent  position.  Is  it  possi- 
ble to  believe  in  salvation  by  character  and  by 
faith  at  the  same  time  ?  We  certainly  are  con- 
vinced that  the  two  statements  are  the  counter- 
parts of  each  other.  They  are  no  more  incon- 
sistent than  rowing  a  boat  with  two  oars. 

Then  we  are  asked  what  we  mean  by  salva- 
tion by  faith  ?  And  we  reply  that  salvation  by 
faith  is  simply  trusting  in  the  forgiving  love 
of  God  manifested  to  us  through  Christ. 
For  we  find  that  it  is  impossible  to  find  salva- 
tion by  character  until  one  obtains  a  fresh  start 
through  forgiveness.  And  it  is  not  necessarily 
the  worst  types  of  people  who  are  discouraged 
by  their  past  faihires ;  on  the  contrary,  they  are 
quite  often  the  very  highest  types  morally.  But 
they  realise  that  when  the  past  is  forgiven,  in 
the  companionship  of  Christ  they  are  able  with 
a  lighter  heart,  with  a  keener  enthusiasm,  to 
try  to  do  the  Divine  will  in  thought,  word, 
and  deed.  So  that  forgiveness  has  an  inspir- 
ing influence  upon  the  production  of  charac- 
ter. There  is  the  possibility  of  growth  in  char- 
acter as  a  result  of  salvation  by  faith,  which 
could  not  be  realised  by  any  other  means.  And 
we  are  convinced  that  many  have  neither  the 
encouragement  nor  the  power  to  achieve  char- 


Under  Cross-Examination        139 

acter  because  they  have  no  light  upon  how  past 
failures  may  be  forgiven. 

We  are  sometimes  interrogated  by  the  theo- 
logian. He  asks  us  if  we  believe  in  the  inspira- 
tion of  the  Bible.  Again  we  answer  that  we 
do.  But  we  have  no  theory  of  inspiration.  If 
some  one  were  to  point  out  an  error  in  it,  we 
would  not  in  the  least  be  disturbed.  We  begin 
with  that  part  of  the  Bible  which  finds  us, 
which  speaks  to  our  elemental  needs.  And  it 
is  a  matter  of  experience  so  far  as  we  are  con- 
cerned that  no  other  book  so  answers  the  needs 
of  our  soul,  besides  our  experience  is  verified 
by  the  testimony  of  multitudes  of  believers. 
And  we  expect  that  more  and  more  of  the  .Bible 
will  find  us  as  we  go  on  growing  in  mind  and 
soul.  The  inspiration  of  the  Bible  will  become 
an  expanding  reality  as  we  live,  as  we  suffer, 
as  we  are  tempted,  as  we  are  guided.  And  as 
we  make  the  Bible  increasingly  our  own  by  the 
process  of  spiritual  assimilation,  that  which  we 
so  make  our  own  cannot  be  taken  from  us,  for 
it  has  become  part  of  our  spiritual  existence. 

In  the  meantime,  when  we  meet  difficulties 
in  the  Bible  we  simply  lay  them  on  one  side. 
We  do  exactly  with  the  Bible  what  we  do  with 
the  things  which  we  find  in  the  physical  world 
for  the  nourishment  of  our  bodies.    If  we  eat 


140    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

a  nut,  although  the  whole  of  the  nut  is  a 
product  of  nature,  we  do  not  partake  of  the 
shell.  It  would  be  folly  to  break  our  teeth  on 
the  shell  when  there  is  enough  to  satisfy  hunger 
in  the  kernel.  So  just  as  we  lay  aside  part  of 
a  nut  we  lay  aside  that  part  of  the  Bible  which 
we  cannot  make  our  own  for  the  present;  it 
may  be  that  what  we  cannot  appropriate  now, 
we  shall  be  able  to  make  our  own  at  a  later 
stage  of  our  experience.  In  the  meantime 
there  is  enough  spiritual  food  for  our  imme- 
diate necessities. 

Our  theological  friend  is  anxious  to  know 
why  we  believe  in  the  Deity  of  Christ.  And 
we  reply  that  we  believe  in  His  deity  because 
He  finds  us.  He  satisfies  our  elemental  long- 
ings. We  are  further  asked  how  we  define 
Christ,  and  our  answer  is  that  we  are  not  able 
to  define  Him.  Nor  do  we  consider  it  neces- 
sary to  define  Him,  since  He  is  a  living  person 
with  us  in  the  present.  While  we  contend  for 
the  historical  reality  of  His  earthly  life,  we 
would  not  at  the  present  stage  of  our  experi- 
ence lose  the  actual  nearness  of  Christ  to  us 
in  the  present  hour  by  becoming  confused  by 
discussions  concerning  Him  which  are  beyond 
us.  If  He  were  merely  a  memory,  if  Christ 
had  ceased  to  live  in  the  midst  of  the  realities 


Under  Cross-Examination        141 

of  human  life  with  the  close  of  His  human 
life,  then  the  case  would  be  vastly  different. 
But  since  we  are  conscious  of  His  friendship 
here  and  now,  we  go  on  our  way  undisturbed 
by  questions  with  which  only  expert  minds  of 
the  highest  order  have  the  capacity  to  deal. 

The  practical  man  asks  us  why  we  need 
Christ  in  our  life,  why  we  cannot  get  along  by 
ourselves  doing  the  best  we  can.    Our  answer 
is  that  we  need  a  wiser  and  stronger  power 
than  ourselves  to  get  out  of  our  life  what  is 
there.     Self-government  is  a  delusion,   when 
we  think  we  are  ruling  ourselves  we  are  deceiv- 
ing ourselves,  for  it  may  be  our  baser  selves, 
it  may  be  our  surroundings,  which  are  manag- 
ing our  lives.    For  absolute  freedom  is  impos- 
sible.     And  in  Christ  we  find  a  ruler  who 
knows  our  nature  and  who  can  get  the  most 
out  of  us.     Christ  satisfies  our  inner  life,  and 
saves  us  from  the  paralysis  of  discouragement. 
The  rationahst  questions  us  as  to  whether 
we  can  reason  out  all  our  positions.    And  when 
we  answer  that  we  cannot  he  asks  us  why  we 
hold  them.     And  we  simply  inform  him  that 
our  positions  are  not  unreasonable.  We  accept 
things  in  other  realms  which  we  cannot  reason 
out.     Pure  reason  is  not  the  only  part  of  our 
being  which  has  rights.     Psychology  tells  us 


142    Religion  and  the  Growing  Mind 

of  a  sub-conscious  self,  which  is  not  unreason- 
able, and  which  acts  instinctively  without  the 
process  of  explicit  reasoning.     There  is  a  dis- 
tinct    place     for     intuition     which     outruns 
knowledge,   and   creates  its  own  verification. 
Almost  every  forward  movement  in  the  world 
might  be  expressed  as  an  act  of  faith.    Religion 
is  one  among  many  spheres  of  enterprise  where 
the  venture  of  faith  is  of  the  essence  of  reality. 
The  cynic  asks  us  if  we  are  the  disciples  of 
Christ  in  order  to  be  happy  and  to  obtain  at 
last  a  heavenly  reward.    We  answer  him  that 
we  get  these.     But  they  are  a  by-product. 
Christ  fits  us  for  service.    Christ  encourages  us 
to  turn  our  thoughts  from  ourselves.     It  is  in 
the  attitude  of  devotion  to  His  will,  in  the 
attempt  to  realise  brotherhood  in  human  rela- 
tionships, in  the  effort  to  bring  in  the  Kingdom 
of  God,  that  Christ  answers  the  ultimate  needs 
of  our  being. 


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